The Stage Manager
by legolover
Summary: (AU Theatre!Lock) Molly Hooper is the newest stage manager for the Holmes Theatre Company under the direction of Sherlock Holmes. The situation wouldn't have felt as stressful if Sherlock didn't keep riling up the actors to make them quit or the fact that the company's rival Jim Moriarty was slowly driving them out of business. Nothing is ever easy when Sherlock Holmes is involved
1. Chapter 1

**The Stage Manager****  
**  
_Rated T for some language__  
_  
Summary: AU Molly Hooper is the newest stage manager at the _Holmes Theatre Company_ under the direction of Sherlock Holmes. Prompt "Different Careers" challenge from the_ ladiesofSherlock_ on tumblr.

_A/N: This is a one-shot for now though maybe if I have time I could expand upon it. That will take more brainstorming than I have the time for at the current moment. Otherwise, enjoy!_

* * *

The theatre world seemed romantic with glamorous actors, costumes, and lighting, but hardly anyone ever wondered about the petty arguments, late nights, and dirty work that made everything look beautiful. The running joke was that you must have been a masochist for picking one of the more grueling art forms to be a part of. Between the half-baked ideas and egomaniacs it was a wonder anything actually got accomplished, but Molly Hooper had never been easily dissuaded so she wholeheartedly pledged herself to a life in the arts.

She didn't love the gritty, ugly elements of her profession, but as a stage manager she had learned to take those ridiculous ideas and make them function perfectly, to cut down the divas backstage by gently reminding them that they could be replaced (_She really did hate to do that, but some people could not maintain their professional decorum when they stepped under those stage lights_), and to remember that it was always worth it in the end. _Always._

However, even the most sensible people in the business have that one thing that sends them over the edge. That slight hiccup that makes people throw their hands up in the air and think: _Dear God, what have I done to myself?_ Molly was finding out the hard way that she was not as immune to this as she had once hoped. For as she sat in the _Holmes Theatre Company's_ production house the only thing she could think was that working under the direction of the great Sherlock Holmes might really be the death of her.

"There are some directors who are cruel and then there is Sherlock." Mary Morstan, the Theater Manager of the company, had briefed Molly on the situation when she had approached the young woman about the stage management position. "The man has gone through three stage managers and nearly brought almost all those who work with him to either tears or blows."

"Then why is he still here?" Molly had asked.

"He's brilliant," Mary had said with a reluctant sigh. "And it helps that his brother Mycroft actually owns the theater along with him. Apparently nepotism doesn't matter if you actually own the damn building."

Mary's warnings about Sherlock's temperament were also stacked with a generous yearly contract and plenty of groveling. If Molly agreed to work with the Director and survived the experience she could become a permanent addition at the theater house. It was a smart move career wise. She would have been a fool not to accept. Except now, two weeks into the last four weeks of the rehearsal period, she was seriously regretting her decision.

"Ms. Hooper!" Sherlock barked at her from across the theater seats and she lurched forward in her chair as she tried not to wince under his direct ire. "What is the blocking for Anderson? He's flailing around like an idiot on stage."

Molly coughed as she noticed all the actors looking like a mix between uncomfortable and just angry except Irene. That woman never looked like she was ever in any discomfort.

"Anderson, you need to move stage left before you make the dramatic sweep to Sally and make sure you grab the letter from the desk in the process," Molly said unclear about why Sherlock was upset. Anderson had gone through the direction properly.

"And?" Sherlock was twiddling his riding crop in his hand. It was his favorite thing to use when he wanted to make a point. Molly was waiting for the day when he actually hit someone with it.

"And…he uh…kisses her." Molly stopped as Sherlock rapt the riding crop against the side of the seat he was in before standing up, jogging down the row towards Molly, and yanking the prompt book out of her hands. He flipped through the pages in a mad rush as he scowled at the lines of text.

"You've missed several of my notes, Ms. Hooper," he said with a raised eyebrow.

Molly ducked her head as she burned scarlet under his gaze and a few of the cast members snickered at her response. She never missed notes (_well, okay maybe that first week when she'd been introduced to him and was trying to keep herself from blushing like mad whenever he stared at her_). When she took the job she didn't think that man would be so _beautiful_ and it became terribly distracting. The attraction lessened the more he opened his mouth, but she'd been a mess when she'd started working for him and had since tried to remedy her professional behavior. She thought she'd been doing well.

"I don't t-think t-that I missed anything—" He rolled his eyes.

"Do stop stuttering, Ms. Hooper. It does not help the situation." Sherlock dropped the book back into her lap, breaking the trance he seemed to hold over her. He launched himself over the edge of the stage and up onto the proscenium platform as the actors steeled themselves for a tongue lashing. "Anderson, have you ever had an erection?"

"Excuse me?" Anderson's gaze narrowed into tiny slits at Sherlock and Molly groaned, dropping her head into her hands.

"That could be the only explanation for your lack of passion in the scene," Sherlock said amused as Anderson sputtered and chuffed at his words.

"Sherlock, stop." She begged, but he ignored her, pressing on with his latest assessment.

"Oh right, you're actually screwing Donovan so of course you have." Sherlock's gaze swept over to the enraged, curly-haired woman who was sitting on the stage couch.

"Piss off!" Sally spat as she stood up from her seat with her large rehearsal skirt flowing around her in a tangle of fabric.

"Hmm…" Sherlock cocked his head to the side. "Obviously, you're not getting complete satisfaction otherwise you wouldn't look like you were in heat every time Irene walked across the stage."

"Don't pretend you don't like it too, Sherlock." Irene's red lips parted into a smile as she hopped up onto one of the tables on stage and crossed her legs. Molly noted, much to her annoyance, that Irene had cut a long slit in the side of her rehearsal skirt so her legs were always properly displayed.

"Screw you, Holmes!" Anderson launched himself at Sherlock, but Greg Lestrade, the main actor who Molly really admired for his continued patience with their director, grabbed hold of the man to keep him back.

"You're not my type," Sherlock said with a wide smirk. "I think Donovan would get a little jealous if you tried to anyways."

"That's it. I'm done dealing with you, prick." Sally dropped her rehearsal skirt to the floor as she walked off backstage. Molly made a distressed cry as she launched herself out of the chair and up the proscenium stage to take after the actress.

"Sally, wait!" Molly called to her in a frantic voice, but the woman was already gone. The actress had tried to back out of the production twice and Molly had managed to get her back each time. She hoped she could manage a third round.

"Sherlock, perhaps we should take a break." Molly ran back on stage where Sherlock was arguing once again with Anderson who was turning purple in the face with pent-up rage. Sherlock narrowed his eyes on her while she wrung her hands together with nervous energy.

_Please don't be difficult. Please don't be difficult, _she thought in silent repetitive prayer.

"Take fifteen," Sherlock finally said.

Molly breathed out in relief and dashed backstage. She ran to the green room where she found Sally grabbing her things and making a charge for the front of the theater.

"Sally, please stop." Molly tripped over her feet as she blocked Sally's escape. Her arms spread wide across the hallway to box the young woman into the corridor. "It's been a bad night. You've gotten through worse with him." Sally growled as she ducked under one of Molly's arms and walked faster out of the theater. "Please, don't do this."

"I'm not posturing myself for that bastard anymore!" Sally's screeching echoed through the building. "I'm not like you, Hooper. I don't just bend over like a fucking dog and take it. I'm finished!" Molly stood there frozen for a moment as Sally walked out of the theater.

_Do not cry_, Molly thought to herself. _You've heard much worse than that_. _She didn't mean it. She's just frustrated with Sherlock._

She took her phone out from her pocket and made a quick call to Mary who screamed more than a few obscenities over hearing that Sherlock had lost another one of their actors.

"That's it," Mary said. "I'm calling Mycroft. He hasn't been involved enough in this whole process and needs to get his brother under control." She cursed and sputtered a few more times on the phone before promising she would fix it all and wishing Molly good luck for the rest of the rehearsal. Molly didn't think that luck was going to solve any of the problems they had.

When she walked back into the theater the actors had dissipated and Sherlock was reclining on the couch with his fingers perched into a point under his nose while John Watson, his best friend and the technical director for the company, tried to knock some sense into him.

"Sherlock, you can't insult the actors all the time." Molly heard John say to the man as he collapsed into a nearby chair on stage.

While John Lectured Sherlock on the merits of good behavior Molly took soft steps down the right side staircase of the proscenium into the auditorium to get into her bag. Maybe she could just pop around the corner to the café and get a cuppa. She could get a biscuit.

_On second thought,_ Her hand hovered above her wallet for a moment in debate before diving in and pulling out some more money. _A whole box of them should do it_.

"Why didn't you tell Mary that Sally insulted you?" Molly clutched her chest in panic as Sherlock's baritone voice reached her ears. She turned to find him sitting upright and staring at her.

"She did what?" John looked over at her. "Are you okay, Molly?"

"I-I'm fine," Molly said clearing her throat as she tried to smile at the man. "I've gotten worse before."

"You didn't answer my question." Sherlock stood up. Impatience oozed off him as he hovered near the apron of the stage looking down at her.

"Sherlock," John said in a warning tone.

"S-she wasn't angry at me." Molly fiddled with the sleeves of her cardigan. "She only said those things because of—"

"Me." Sherlock finished her sentence and Molly nodded as he jumped from the stage to the auditorium floor. "You disapprove of my methods."

"I d-didn't say that," Molly said clearing her throat as he walked up to her. She stepped back into the folding seat to try to keep her distance from him.

"Don't lie to me," he said enunciating each word as he stopped in front of her. "You're horrible at it." Molly didn't know how to respond to that as she shifted uncomfortably against the folded seat which was pushing against the back of her knees in an awkward, painful manner.

"Sherlock, you need to stop," John said, but the director did not even turn to acknowledge the other man as he kept his focus on Molly.

"I just think you could be a little nicer," she said staring at the ground to avoid staring up into his deep, ever-changing blue-green irises. "I'm worried you're going to lose the cast and crew before the opening in two weeks."

"Anderson and Donovan are easily replaceable." Sherlock scoffed at the notion.

"Replaceable with whom?" Molly shook her head as she found her argument gaining traction. "Mary seems to think that Moriarty's company has poached most of our best actors." Sherlock growled at his rival's name and glared at Molly who was now biting the inside of her cheek for even mentioning the man.

James Moriarty had made it his mission for the past two seasons to try to gather all the personnel from the _Holmes Theatre Company_ to come work for him in an attempt to cripple the Holmes' talent base and he was succeeding. There weren't many out there who wanted to work for Holmes men anymore. Their audience was even pilfered as they were showing more favoritism for the camp and razzmatazz of Moriarty's productions over the Holmes' more intricate, thought-provoking pieces. If Sherlock could have been a bit more reasonable then maybe they wouldn't have had this issue.

"I-It's the truth." Molly managed to stutter out. "You need to be careful, Sherlock."

"And I think you're overstepping your bounds, Ms. Hooper," Sherlock said cocking his head to the side as he studied her. His eyes appraising her from head to toe.

Molly swallowed hard and fiddled with the ends of her auburn hair. She knew that look. For some reason Sherlock found it charming to dissect his actors as well as he did a script and its characters. She had managed to avoid most of his scrutiny until now.

"Don't do it." She heard John whisper from the stage as he ran a hand down his face.

"You did not graduate from a top university for your profession," Sherlock said placing his hands on the sides of the chair she was leaning against and forcing her to sit down. "You live alone with a cat—" He plucked off a piece of hair from her cherry covered cardigan. "You worked very hard to get here and yet…you doubt yourself at every turn even when others sing your praises. Of course, you only _really_ chose to remain backstage because you were told you couldn't make it as an actress. No personality, rubbish face, barely any breasts if you have any at all under the mass amount of layers you wear—" His hands lingered as though to touch her cardigan, but Molly had clutched the front of it closed, fisting it into one of her hands hand as she tried to keep herself from exploding from a mixture of fury and despair.

_He'll stop soon,_ she thought. _He'll get bored with this game and stop.__  
_  
If Sherlock noticed her distress he didn't care or he reveled in it. Molly wasn't certain as she just closed her eyes and winced as he continued.

"You've also been single for a while and have a disastrous dating history so you try to compensate for that in your own professional life by overworking yourself." Sherlock's rapier like mind picked Molly apart. "It's probably why you haven't given up on this job yet. You're desperation for human attention keeps you going. That's why you haven't quit because deep down, Molly Hooper, you are lonely and will tolerate even my presence to quench that need."

"Sherlock!" John was screaming now as the other actors had come back from break and started filling the stage. "That is enough."

Sherlock looked at John as he leaned back from the chair and then stole a glance back at Molly who felt like she was going to burst into a million pieces as her eyes glossed over with unshed tears. This was everything that she hated about her profession. This production, Sherlock, the rivalries—these were the things that could break her. If Molly had been ordinary she would run out the theater, collapsed into a ball of tears, and never would have never looked back. But she was far from ordinary.

She stared at the prompt book on the ground before bending over to pick it up off the floor. Her hands were shaking as she clutched the book and there were a few audible gasps and whispers at the sight of her. She dared to look up at Sherlock, her lips pressed into a thin line.

"You say the most horrible things." She murmured barely audible. He made no response and she wiped her eyes before flipping through the book to where they had left off. Her hands traced over her organized notes and she felt a resolve to prove Sherlock wrong. She looked back at up him again as her eyes started drying and said: "Where do you want to go from since Sally has left?"

Sherlock showed outright surprise at her question. She sat up straighter in her seat as she waited for his response while her sadness depleted into the professional calm she hid behind.

"You're not leaving?" Sherlock's anger had ebbed into something new which Molly recognized as curiosity. She'd done the unexpected in reaction to his horrid tantrum and now he would be desperate to know why.

She knew that he thought his deduction of her would have rendered her useless. She would probably sulk in misery once she got home, but she would not run away from something she loved. Her commitment to her own craft outweighed even the most horrendous barbs that Sherlock could doll out. After all, he was just a man. A brilliant, gorgeous, infuriating man, but he was still just flesh and bone like her and she could read him better than he thought she could. She wasn't the only who had self-doubt flowing through their veins.

"Y-You don't know everything, Mr. Holmes." Her voice had a clipped edge to it even with a slight stutter."Now, where would you like to start from?"

Sherlock stood straighter, inclined his head in submission, and turned to the rest of the cast and John who were watching the interaction between the Director and Stage Manager with anxiety.

"Begin with the dinner scene after Sally's supposed death," Sherlock said. "John, bring me my riding crop, please." The use of the polite word caused a few eyebrows to rise as the technical director threw the object at Sherlock and the actors prepared for the jump to the beginning of act two.

Molly helped them prepare and set the stage before she returned to her seat. This time though Sherlock sat beside her. He didn't say anything to her aside from a few notes he needed her to carry out and the rest of the rehearsal was a blessed arrangement of peace. At the end of the night, once Molly had cleared off extra materials from the stage and had finished packing her messenger bag, Sherlock came up and stared at her for a silent moment. John was standing nearby with his arms crossed as Sherlock looked like he was trying to find the right way to say whatever was on his mind while Molly attempted to not shift uneasily under his intense scrutiny. Vague notions that he might fire her passed through Molly's mind. She held her breath as he spoke.

"I'm sorry, Molly Hooper." Sherlock finally managed to say as Molly dropped her things to the floor in comical shock. Of all the things she was expecting him to say that had not been one of them.

"Sherlock—" She was babbling with a sudden need to reassure him that it was fine even if his apology had been warranted. He ignored her stumbling verbal repertoire and handed her bag back to her.

"Goodnight, Molly," Sherlock said in parting as he walked out of the theater with John Watson close behind him.

Yes, theatre was not always glamorous and Sherlock would certainly still be the death of her one of these days, but in that moment Molly Hooper just breathed in contentment because no matter what it was always worth it one way or another. _Always_.


	2. Chapter 2

"_**The stage lost a fine actor, even as science lost  
an acute reasoner, when he became a specialist in crime."  
**_– John Watson,  
_The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes_ (A Scandal in Bohemia)  
by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

******Ch. 2 Memorize and Analyze**  


The Theater was dark Mondays which allowed for everyone to go home and do some much-needed laundry or in Molly's case just sleep. Mycroft Holmes had the sense to realize they couldn't exhaust everyone to the point of hysteria unlike Sherlock who found that a day without work kept him bored. Molly supposed that's why Sundays, which were normally considered half-days for everyone, became a marathon affair when you worked with Sherlock Holmes. He was insatiable in his quest for excellence in his art and there were nights where she could not understand how John managed to keep up with the director for so long. It was noon and all Molly wanted to do was curl up back into bed and call it a day.

That's why she should have known better than to answer the phone. She only checked it briefly to note it wasn't Sherlock before answering, but there are worse things in life than trying to cater to her director.

"Ms. Hooper." Anthea's crisp, round tones made Molly clear her throat to try to get rid of her afternoon rasp. "So sorry to disturb you on a Monday, but Mr. Holmes needs to speak with you."

_Mycroft._ Molly winced at the thought of going to see her other boss.

"Is it urgent?" She hesitated using the word and scrunched up her nose knowing she sounded a little too needy in her desire to not meet with the man.

"I wouldn't have called if it wasn't," Anthea said. "A car is coming in a half an hour to get you. We'll see you soon."

Molly dropped her phone back on her nightstand before flopping onto the bed and running her hands over her face. She didn't mind Mycroft. He was more congenial about his approach than Sherlock ever could be, but that didn't stop Molly from thinking he was calculating her usefulness whenever they saw each other. She knew he outright scoffed at the notion of her being Sherlock's stage manager.

"I doubt you'll last a day, Ms. Hooper," he had said to her. "But you're welcome to try."

She knew he'd been surprised when she'd even made it past the first week.

Molly had only seen Mycroft face to face twice. Once when he'd interviewed her and another when he'd unexpectedly dropped into a rehearsal which had turned into an outright disaster the moment he had made his presence known.

Everyone was aware that working for the two Holmes men was like playing an elaborate game of chess where the two Kings fought for the dominance over the board with their various pawns (in this case their company members). For the most part there was peace between the two siblings as they revolved in two separate worlds. Sherlock focused on the actual theatre pieces while Mycroft worked more with the schmoozing of patrons and donors. It was rare for these two intellectual titans to cross into each other. When Mycroft dared to tread into Sherlock's 'play space' it was secure in the knowledge that his baby brother could complain all he wanted, but it would not change the fact that his brother was half owner. The two men had to begrudgingly admit that they needed each other for their certain brands of genius.

That night Mycroft had popped into rehearsal the brothers had traded barbs so detestable that it had derailed the run through for almost an hour while Sherlock fumed in a corner and John attempted to coax him back to work. Molly remembered how she'd thought about stuffing both of them into a nearby closet and telling them to work it out like gentleman instead of like five-year-olds. She'd never be so bold as to even suggest such a thing, but both John and Mary had nodded, laughed, and told her she wasn't the only one who thought that.

Therefore having only seen this man twice in her entire working career at the theater Molly felt only dread. It had been well-known that face to face meetings with Mycroft Holmes usually meant something much more grave was about to transpire.

_What if he's going to cancel the production?_ Molly bolted up out of bed in panic. After all, they were still missing one of their key actors.

Sally Donovan hadn't responded to Mary Morstan's phone calls or emails. She was gone like a wisp of smoke into the air which was making the stage manager nervous. Molly had secretly hoped that Mycroft had gotten a hold of Sally and leaned on her heavily enough that the actress returned without the slightest hiccup. Molly was beginning to think that maybe they would have to cut the play entirely which did not bode well for her job let alone the state of the theater itself.

She didn't have much time left to ponder this fate as she noted with alarm she'd let fifteen minutes pass with her fretting. She whirled through her bedroom in a mad dash to make herself look presentable, forgoing her usual cherry cardigan and khakis for a blue dress and a pair of flats she'd only wear to interviews. She tugged her hair into a ponytail, hastened to put on a light bit of makeup before grabbing her trench coat and heading out the door. She'd just stepped onto the curb when the black BMW rolled to a stop in front of her. She reached for the handle of the car only to jump back when Sherlock exited the vehicle and held the door open for her.

"S-Sherlock, d-did Mycroft send for you?" She stammered as the shock of his presence slowly released its hold on her.

"Mycroft wanted to see us both. Get in, Molly." He ordered with all the gentleness of a lion.

Taking great pains not to touch him, she slid into the backseat and he slammed the door shut as he followed close behind. Sherlock did not talk during their drive which didn't make Molly any less worried about the state of things.

She fiddled with her hands as she wondered where she could start looking for work next. The other guest directors for the theater already had their own stage managers. Perhaps the _Warton Children's Company_ would be willing to have her back. She wrinkled her nose in detestation. It would be a major step backwards in her career. Also, as much as she liked children the mass groupings of them at _Warton's_ were unnerving and tiresome. She was a stage manager not a babysitter.

She glanced over at Sherlock. Well, they weren't as exhausting as trying to keep up with a singular man who seemed to have made it his mission to test Molly's patience at every turn. It was probably one of his experiments to see how long she could last. Forget the drama happening in the play, the moxie of one stage manager warranted scrupulous amounts of energy and speculation.

"Molly, you're thinking too loud," Sherlock said.

"Sorry…?" The apology came out as a question. She wasn't sure how her own thoughts could intrude upon the director's own contemplations.

"Stop worrying," he said. "You won't have to go back to _Warton's_."

"Oh." Molly felt an ease of pressure lift from her heart. He couldn't make that kind of a promise, but it was still nice to hear him say it. "It would be fine, Sherlock. I'd manage if something happened."

"It won't," Sherlock said with conviction as they came to a stop in front of the theater. Her hope in his words was unfounded, but as they were ushered into Mycroft's office by Anthea, Molly couldn't bring herself to doubt her director.

Mycroft stood upon their entrance and gestured to the chairs in front of his desk which Molly slid into with a slight squeak of the legs against the hardwood floor. She noted that Mycroft's face was in a somber cast and thought, with a tad of silliness, of telling him that it might stick that way permanently if he continued to look so grim. Neither of the Holmes men seemed capable of handling that brand of humor though so she wisely kept her mouth shut.

"Are the chairs not to your liking now?" Mycroft sat back down while Sherlock remained standing.

"I prefer to stand when bad news is about to be delivered," Sherlock said walking around the back of the empty chair and Molly's. She was acutely aware of his presence and found herself sitting up a little straighter when a feather light touch graced her shoulders as he crossed to Mycroft's expansive bookshelf to fiddle with the manuscripts and memorabilia from past shows. Mycroft attempted to bore a hole into the back of Sherlock's head with his glacial stare before he turned to Molly.

"Ms. Hooper, I've tried to understand why you've remained here as long as you have," Mycroft said taking up his tea cup into his hands. "Not that we aren't grateful, but your presence displaces all known reason."

"This is a good opportunity," Molly said. Was this really what their conversation would be about? Why she had outlasted her predecessors?

"Not that good," Mycroft said sighing as he set his teacup back down. "My hope was that you'd have a calming influence on Sherlock." The man in question snorted at the idea. "It seems he is beyond influence these days even from his own stage manager and technical director."

"I …well…S-Sherlock…" Molly stuttered to try to come up with an answer to such a statement and finally just clamped her mouth shut, startled over the idea that Mycroft could think she would have any kind of sway over Sherlock. Most days the man walked all over her.

"I would suggest you stop if your only desire for this meeting was to accost Molly for her less than admirable performance in '_calming_' me," Sherlock said causing the hair on the back of Molly's neck to rise. He clasped his hands behind his back and glared at his brother. "She is my stage manager not my watcher. To even suggest such a thing is to diminish her intelligence and skill set."

Molly swallowed a lump in her throat as Sherlock and Mycroft glared at one another from across the office desk while she tried to process Sherlock's comment.

"I was wrong," Mycroft said as his gaze shifted to Molly. "_You'__ve_ had an influence on him after all." Molly was still at a loss for words and just stared back at him as she flexed her fingers before folding them in her lap. "Our meeting is to discuss how Sherlock's latest outburst has cost us two actors."

"Two?" Molly's voice squeaked as she felt her panic from the previous rehearsal resurge.

"Obviously Donovan and Anderson," Sherlock said in a bored tone. "I knew their dating one another would be a problem."

"But they're two of the main characters," Molly said not understanding why clearly no one else was panicking more at this issue. "Don't they have contracts in order for them not to do this?"

"They broke them," Mycroft said with a sneer. "Something for which I'll make sure they pay for later. For now our main concern is an immediate recasting."

"But Morstan hasn't gotten anyone," Sherlock said referring to the theater manager.

"Your unbridled temper has tapped out our resources, Sherlock." Mycroft's jaw set into a firm, angry line. "Moriarty is killing us."

"Yet here we are," Sherlock said gesturing to the air around them. "Does your assistant know she's been chosen to fulfill the role of Nina?"

"She was briefed," Mycroft said and Molly looked back the doorway expecting the young woman to march back into the room to change her mind.

"Who will play Constantine?" Molly whispered and the two men looked at her as though they finally remembered she was sitting there.

"I will," Sherlock said with a shrug.

"But you can't!" Molly said. Sherlock raised an eyebrow as she flushed and shook her head. "I m-mean y-you're directing. H-how will you have the time?"

"My memory is far better than you give me credit for, Molly," Sherlock said drawing out her name in a way that made her squirm. She almost wished he'd go back to calling her Ms. Hooper again. It seemed less potent to her nerves. "I have the time."

"You better," Mycroft said. "If this production sinks then we will be ruined." Sherlock just smirked and walked back to the door.  
"Come on, Molly, we have work to do!"

Molly jumped up from her seat, stuttered some sort of hurried goodbye to Mycroft, and dashed after Sherlock who was already making his way out the main lobby and into the theater house.

"Sherlock, wait—" Molly pulled back on his coast as they entered the theater and he whirled to face her. "What are we doing?"

"Working on my lines," he said. "I need your assistance to play the other characters."

"But couldn't you just use—"

"John is on a date with Ms. Morstan, Mrs. Hudson is at tea with a friend, and Mycroft has Anthea tied up the rest of the day." Sherlock's rapid fire explanation made Molly's head spin and she had to take a moment to process it all before he shoved a script into her hands and pushed her up the side stairs and onto the stage. "There's only you, Molly. I need you." He placed his hands on her shoulders and looked down at her.

"Sherlock." She let out a heavy sigh. "I'm exhausted and I have so much to do today—"

"I haven't seen you wear this dress before, Molly." Sherlock interrupted the stage manager as his eyes roved over her . She felt her neck and cheeks burn with the attention. "Blue suits you."

Molly's heart rate speed up a bit as he smiled—just a small one. Those tiny ones he used to make her stay for just one more hour to go over notes or the bring him coffee (_okay, she did that now of her own accord. She really needed to stop learning his preferences_), or when he reminded her how vital it was for him to wake her in the middle of the night to explain a new blocking technique. That damn, smug smile was all she could think about. It was pathetic to care this much for this man who was such an infuriating genius. But she did and he needed her.

"Alright, Sherlock," she said. "But only for a couple of hours. I have things to do."

* * *

A couple of hours turned into four then to six and if it hadn't been for the whale of a growl Molly's stomach had made she was sure that Sherlock would have kept her there all night. He'd been manic in his insistence to learn and assimilate the character. Molly admitted to herself that it had been a treat to watch him work as an actor. He was different from Anderson; in fact, Molly would say he was better except for when Constantine would have to express his love for Nina. He was quite rubbish with that though she wasn't about to tell him otherwise.

"You're of no use to me when you're starving. You can't focus," Sherlock said when her stomach let out another almighty growl.

"Most people can't, Sherlock." Molly huffed as she grabbed her bag. She never could understand how her director managed to suffer two to three days at a time without needing food. John had warned her ahead of time that he did when he felt he had to really focus. Molly just found it ridiculous and unhealthy.  
"I'll buy you some crisps and we can continue straight away—"

"No, Sherlock!" Molly stopped him before he rushed to the vending machines. "P-Please…I have to go home. I need to feed—"

"You left Toby enough food and water that he can survive without you."

"How'd you know—" Molly shook her head as she stopped herself. "Never mind, but no crisps, please. You need to process what you've just memorized and I have to eat an actual meal."

Sherlock eyed her in the way he stopped to make an assessment. Instead of launching into a brash new round of intense scrutiny, which Molly had been breathlessly expecting, he just cleared his throat and nodded in agreement.

"You'll like Angelo's," he said shrugging on his Belstaff coat. "If we move quickly we can beat the crowd." Molly stared at his retreating back. Had Sherlock Holmes just asked her to dinner?

"Unless you'd prefer to eat alone." He called out to her from the entryway to the theater.

"N-No!" She shook her head and followed after him biting her lip, fairly certain that all her professional decorum had flittered off for the evening as they got into a taxi together.

Why couldn't she have had a director who didn't tie her stomach into knots? She's been around gorgeous looking men before, actors and technicians alike, but Sherlock was the only one to ever rattle her in a way she deemed unhealthy. It should have been easier to just ignore him. He was a prat on his best days and a child on his worst. He was insufferable to the point of making Molly want to break things _(sometimes his face if she was in a particularly dark mood)_. The only conclusion she could make over her behavior was that, like John, she'd seen something different in the director.

The way he became passionate about the text he was working with, how his frenzied perfectionism was driving for better performances from actors, and that even though he was almost gleeful in the rivalry between him and Moriarty that his compulsive fiddling with objects notated a sense of annoyance perhaps even panic over the situation. He cared about the state of things in his theater and was deeper than the "self-righteous prick" title which many referred to him as. Sherlock was just much more than what he presented himself as and she had a feeling that taking on the role of Constantine was a bigger challenge than he was letting on.

* * *

_Angelo's_ was a nicest restaurant Molly had been to in a long time. Their hostess was quick to seat them away from the crowds near a window and told Sherlock that she would be sure to let Angelo know he was here before she disappeared, leaving the pair alone. Molly gleaned over the menu while Sherlock had taken one look at it and proceeded to drop the item back to the table.

"You should eat, Sherlock," Molly said worrying that he would go on another intense two-day session as he sorted out how to drive his performance.

"Molly, you're not my watcher," He said reminding her of the earlier conversation with Mycroft.

"I know…" Molly said raising the menu to hide her face some more as she whispered to herself. "I just worry about you sometimes."

If he heard the comment, Sherlock didn't acknowledge it and he didn't have much time to as a portly, grey bearded man came up to the table and clapped the director on the back.

"Oh, Sherlock, it's so good to see you!" He eyed Molly with confusion while she smiled unsure of herself. "Where is John? I thought he was your boyfriend."

"Not here tonight," Sherlock said. Angelo looked momentarily confused before shrugging it off.

"Well, you're prettier than John at any rate," Angelo said to Molly. "I'm sure you'll have your hands full dating this man though."

"Oh I'm not….we're not…" She fumbled over her words and looked to Sherlock to get him to correct the situation, but he was absorbed in something on his phone and was not negating the owner's amorous notions.

Molly couldn't place her order soon enough to get Angelo to stop insinuating how she and Sherlock were such a lovely couple. She didn't think she could handle that attention much longer especially not when he walked away and winked at her. Determined to not dwell on the subject further she scrambled to think of anything to distract her from the excruciating truth that this was not a date. She immediately clung to her previous concerns about Sherlock's acting abilities.

"Have you ever acted before, Sherlock?"

"When I was very young I played a pirate," he said.

"That was your first role?" At his nod of ascent Molly imagined a curly-haired, precocious Sherlock running around chasing after Mycroft with a wooden sword. It was almost too adorable to fit in with the man she knew today. "What else have you done?"

"Nothing of note," Sherlock said. "I worked with directors who were inane in their methods and decided my mind was better served there even if my education was brief."

"Did you not finish your degree?" It shouldn't have come as much of a shock to Molly as it did. He didn't get along with anyone in a higher authority seat. She doubted that his professors would have been very fond of a man who could deduce their whole life story just by what they were wearing that day.

"University was boring. Experience was easier to obtain since my family owned a theater and passed half of it to me. I knew what I was doing."  
"That's impressive, Sherlock," Molly said in awe.

"Some would say otherwise," he said in a clipped tone. There was a general hum of a phone vibrating and Sherlock pulled his out to stare at a message.  
Molly scratched the back of her head as he started texting on his phone, his brows knitted into concentration, while they remained in silence. What was she suppose to say? She'd never really spoken with the man on a social level and this was an uncomfortably intimate setting.

_Molly, this is stupid. You can spend time with someone who you work with one on one. He's a man not a tiger, _She thought with irritation.  
_  
_ "Why did you choose to do Chekhov's _The Seagull_?" Molly sipped on her glass of water—no wine, she didn't want to feel that loose around Sherlock as that would only entail being exceedingly honest to the point of embarrassment.

"To make a point." He was still texting at an almost rapid fire rate as though he were in an argument. Molly noted that he didn't seem very pleased.

"What point is that?" She pressed on hoping to engage in more conversation that just simple answers. He sighed in annoyance as his hands hovered over the keys on his phone for a brief second before putting it away. Sitting up straighter in his chair he placed his elbows on the table and laced his fingers together as he looked at her.

"You're not idiotic, Molly," he said. "Surely you can see the answer."

"I don't—"

"Think." Sherlock ordered as he leaned his mouth against his hands. Molly looked down at the tablecloth as she tried to look at the play through her director's eyes. Her answer was taking longer than expected and as his phone vibrated again his angry text message argument continued.

She blocked out the incessant tapping of his fingers to find her answer. Sherlock was methodical. He didn't choose to do something without purpose and forethought behind it. There was a message he liked in the play and it rattled Molly to her core when it revealed itself.

"You like it because everyone is miserable while in love," she said wincing.

"Good," Sherlock said almost sounding pleased, his phone forgotten for the time being. "Sentiment destroys and consumes the main characters. Love and its other atrocities make people vulnerable and weak. Something you should keep in mind when that technician Walter decides to ask you out."

"Walter and I…we're not….he wouldn't—" She shook her head vigorously against the idea. They were just friends.

"He will and you'll want to say yes," Sherlock said glaring out the window seeming disgusted by the idea. "Don't. He's beneath you."

"Why's that?" Sherlock didn't respond as he continued on with his conversation via text. Molly shifted in her seat as she tried to keep herself from blurting out the next question, but her curiosity was voracious.

"Do you really feel that way about love?"

"I didn't choose the play because I'm overly fond of Russian dramas," Sherlock said. "As far as I can tell sentimental attachment only leads to feeling out of control and confused."

"Dorn, who has led a full life with love, is happy and Masha is in a terrible marriage because she is not in love with her husband. How are these not good examples that you need love in your life?" Logically, Molly didn't understand her need to know why Sherlock felt this way. It fit with him as a person. It seemed that the director felt the same as he dropped his phone to the table and stared at her as though she had grown another head.

"My character commits suicide out of misery. How is that not proof that you shouldn't need love?"

That was true. Part of what drove Constantine to commit suicide was the rejection of his love by Nina. How could this not be a sign that people needed to have a better lock on their own emotions?

"If Constantine had seen what Masha was offering to him, an open heart, then maybe he wouldn't have been so miserable." Molly didn't want him to dismiss the potential happiness that Chekhov hinted at for his characters if they only opened their eyes to the possibilities. "Maybe she could have made him happy."

It was a weak argument filled with the sweeter misgivings of a girl rather than a woman with experience. Sherlock didn't respond immediately to her answer and once again appraised Molly through narrowed slits. She didn't flinch or look away. She stared right back at him knowing he could easily read her without much effort. Molly Hooper could hide all she wanted, but Sherlock Holmes would always find her.

"She should have known better than to place her affections with someone that…unstable," He said. Were they even talking about the play anymore? Molly noted the edge in his voice might have hinted otherwise.

"People can't help who they love, Sherlock, but that doesn't mean that kind of affection doesn't have merit," she said feeling the dull ache of sadness creep into her heart.

"I don't see why you invest so much in sentiment," Sherlock said. "You and John have this delusion that it's helpful." Molly felt like she was talking in circles. She knew her argument was a lost cause for both the play and love in general.

"Maybe one day you'll see things differently," she said feeling the regret of having even opened this line of conversation. There was blatantly no hope when it came to loving this man and he was telling her directly to her face. Too bad her heart wasn't more sensible. Maybe then it wouldn't have already given away a piece of it to Sherlock Holmes which was now lost forever.

* * *

**A/N:** Thank you to everyone who encouraged me to continue this story! : ) I'm planning on making this a shorter work- maybe five to six chapters. But I think there will be enough packed in each chapter to make it a well rounded piece. Special thanks to the ladiesofsherlock on tumblr for inciting such an interesting prompt.

Ray: Thanks for reviewing! : ) It was appreciated.  
Nan: Guess what? There's more!


	3. Chapter 3

**Ch. 3 Mysterious Cheekbones and the Deerstalker **

Rehearsals weren't a complete disaster. With the addition of new actors, particularly Sherlock, it would've been reasonable to assume that the play would fall into shambles, but Molly was happy to see that it didn't.

It had been glaringly obvious that everyone was fretted with worry at their first rehearsal back. The production was supposed to be in its finalized shaping period and yet here they were with new actors—one of them their own overbearing director and another who had no stage experience that they knew of. Molly had tried to put on a positive face about it all and even enlisted John to help oversee the first rehearsal in the hopes that maybe his temperament would smooth over Sherlock's tactless one.

The first hour had been dreadful. Sherlock was a complete nuisance attempting to direct while also remaining in character. Trying to be analytical and objective while also being a part of the action did not allow him to separate himself from the production as well as he needed to.

Molly and John both had to remind him on numerous occasions that he wasn't allowed to just stare at the actors he was in a scene with as he also had to participate. The process was grueling to the point where Sherlock flopped onto a stage chair and retreated to his mind palace when the stimulation had become too much. Antics like that made it difficult for the rest of the cast to feel comfortable as Molly had to reassure them with gentle murmurs that this wasn't all dependent upon Sherlock, that they were all doing wonderful work and should be proud of what they had accomplished thus far. That being said, even Molly's ego stroking wasn't enough to pull the troupe out of their blackened mindset.

Consequently, it was Anthea who had managed to bring the motley crew into a better state when, to everyone's utter surprise, she got to rehearsals and knew all her lines as though she had always been a part of the production. Anthea as an actress was the most riveting thing they had ever seen of someone who had, to their knowledge, always been an office worker. When she took the stage it was like Sally Donovan had never been casted at all.  
Molly suspected that Mycroft had prepared her a long time ago when the first signs of tension between Sally and Sherlock had shown. Apparently, the younger Holmes wasn't the only one with a talent for manipulation and observation. Molly had made a mental note to get her boss a Christmas card this year and to never underestimate either of the Holmes man again.

* * *

Midway through their newly casted second rehearsal things had settled into a calmer state. Molly had gone over the blocking with Anthea the night before and she was starting to obtain a better grasp of her stage presence and the character. Sherlock even seemed mildly impressed with her work.

At the end of that rehearsal they attended to Mrs. Hudson the costumer for their final fittings. Although, for Sherlock and Anthea it would be doubtful that they would get to rehearse in their costumes for at least the next couple of days since they were replacements.

Molly was the last to leave the rehearsal hall as she packed up her items. She texted John to let him know they were going to be starting the fittings process because he had been dying to see Sherlock in Anderson's old costume.

"It'll be a great piece for my blog and I need photos. They keep wanting to see what Sherlock looks like," John had said when Molly told him about the final costume check. He ran a private blog that was a simple dictation of his life as a Technical Director as well as the antics of Sherlock Holmes. This would be the first time that his readers would actually get to see the man who couldn't grasp John's vague descriptive concept of a _"thin fellow with mysterious cheekbones"_.

Molly remembered thinking, as her cheeks burned hot with embarrassment, that if anyone were to find her own blog (tucked deep into the recesses of Tumblr) that they would find her descriptions of her director much more compelling. One of her followers, a very cheeky fellow called IOUanApple, said her lively depictions made the man sound a bit of an archetype hero in a Jane Austen novel. He'd then proceeded to add most recently that he was sad to see he had such stiff competition for the well-versed blogger's heart.

It had been rather cheesy and Molly had giggled with the after effect of too much wine in her system as she was not to used to that much attention, but she had assured her follower that her director was a very strict no-no in the dating department because she was just the stage manager and in the long run didn't count much in his sphere of influence. He had yet to respond to that comment and she wondered if that meant an end to his playful flirtation. Molly hoped not. She rather liked follower IOUanApple.

The coupled distraction of her newest supportive follower mixed with the images of her 'mysterious cheekbone' paramour kept Molly locked in her head until she was just about to enter the costume shop and was startled by the arrival of the one man who she had plainly been trying to avoid—Walter.  
"Molly!" He held out his arms and wrapped the tiny woman into a lovely hug which she returned with a pat on his own back as she tried not to suffocate under the weight of her own guilt.

She'd been pointedly ignoring Walter since she'd gone out to dinner with Sherlock. She felt silly for it since the only thing stopping her from associating with the technician was Sherlock's cryptic assessment of the man. He was a perfectly kind individual but the seed of doubt had been planted and, though Molly was sometimes loathe to admit it, Sherlock was a better judge of character than she was which meant that bright, shiny Bradley James-esque gorgeous Walter was under heavier scrutiny than the shy stage manager usually bestowed upon people.

"How are you?" Walter released her from the hug and Molly glanced over his shoulder to notice Sherlock glowering at the pair of them before flourishing back into the costume shop.

"Busy," Molly said thinking that was a rather stupid question for him to ask since they were close to opening night and then frowning as she thought that was rather rude of her to think.

_I've been spending too much time with Sherlock,_ she thought as she tried to smile at Walter.

"I heard you had a recasting," Walter said and then lowered his voice. "Is Sherlock less of a prat when he's an actor or is it only worse?"

"Umm…" Molly squirmed at the idea of speaking about Sherlock in a negative manner.

When John was involved they could relate to the difficulty of working closely with the man, but Walter had never personally been involved in anything that Sherlock did. He'd been on the sidelines under the direction of John or someone else and even though he'd been here longer than Molly to shore up Sherlock's idiosyncrasies that didn't mean she felt comfortable talking about them to him.

"He's actually not that bad," she said which made Walter's eyebrows rise as a frown crossed his lips. "It would be a stressful situation for anyone to step into and he's handling it with care." She neglected to add that he was still rubbish at trying to convey sentiment without seeming like a complete fraud, but success was never an overnight incident.

"That's uh…good for you," Walter said rubbing his palm over the back of his head. Molly murmured in a noncommittal kind of way and smiled.

"Molly!" Sherlock was calling from within the costume shop and she sighed.

"I'll talk to you later, yeah?" She smiled as she brushed past him.

"Wait." Walter reached and clasped onto her hand. Molly looked down at his grip in momentary discomfort before he released it and shoved his hands back into his pockets. "Uh…I don't know if you have any plans after rehearsal on Friday, but I thought that maybe we could have dinner?" Molly felt herself pull back a little when Sherlock's nagging voice rang in her head.

"I…uh…" She stammered and tripped over tongue.

"Molly!" Sherlock flew out with a dramatic whirl of the overcoat he was wearing from the costume shop to glare at her and Walter. "I need you now, Molly Hooper. Now." He made to grab her hand and in that moment Molly realized that maybe all Sherlock had really wanted to do was keep her undivided attention on the production. She'd found nothing wrong with Walter and even though she had (mostly) trusted Sherlock's judgment throughout the rehearsal period he was sincerely lacking in the social department. So why shouldn't she enjoy spending time with a technician who was romance-cover-novel kissable and ready to date her?

"Yes," Molly said to Walter who smiled at her response as she was led away by Sherlock who stopped for a moment, hand grasping her wrist tighter, as the potential couple interacted. "Yes, I'd love to go to dinner." Molly tried to break free from Sherlock, but the tight squeeze he held on her was unrelenting and she eventually just surrendered to his possession of her arm.

"Did you not hear my thoughts on this?" He was frowning as his countenance became a deadly fusion of disappointment and brooding.

_Ah, he's in pout mode,_ Molly thought as she turned to smile at Walter who spoke again.

"I'll text you for details," Walter said and Molly nodded her assent before she was dragged into the costume shop. Sherlock deposited her in a seat next to John who was already writing a new blog post about the costuming experience thus far.

"Molly, you should not go on that date," Sherlock said pacing back and forth in front of her.

"You have a date?" John looked up at Molly along with a few of the other cast members who were being attended to by the other costume assistants.

"Oh uh…Y-Yes," Molly said blushing at the attention.

"That's lovely dear!" Mrs. Hudson broke out into a broad grin as she finished looking over Greg's suit-piece and puttered over to Sherlock with Maeve, her head assistant, at her side. "Whom with?"

"Walter." Sherlock growled the name as though an unpleasant smell had just wafted up his nose.

"Who's that?" Mrs. Hudson looked to John and Molly.

"He's on the lighting crew," John said as he launched into a description before Molly could. "Good worker and nice bloke. I'm sure you'll have a good time." Sherlock was quaking in anger at the notion while he looked himself over in the mirror.

"Oh, is he that cute blonde chap with the nice dimpled smile?" Mrs. Hudson winked at Molly who bit her lip and nodded in assent to her question. "Well he's certainly pretty to look at. I wouldn't mind staring at his face over dinner."

"I fail to see how his dimpled smile is relevant in assessing his character," Sherlock popped the 'd' in dimpled with particular revulsion. "Attractive features hold no baring into whether a person is worthy of merit."

"You would know a thing about that, wouldn't you?" John said with a cough as he beamed at Sherlock.

Molly covered her mouth as she suppressed the urge to giggle when Sherlock sent a withering look John's way.

"Stop being rude, Sherlock," Mrs. Hudson said with a light tap on his arm. "You've been running Molly ragged through the production and she deserves a break from all of that."

"You all fail to see what is glaringly obvious." Sherlock said continuing with his argument without much in the way of support evidence. "Molly's judgment cannot be trusted while she is currently ovulating in a biological need to mate and Walter, who sends off pheromones like a cave man, seems more attractive when in reality he is a weak and pathetic creature."

"Sherlock!" Molly squeaked in mortification and outrage. "I'm not ruled by my hormones." He appraised her again with a pointed glare.

"I think this time you most definitely are," he said and then amusement sprouted on his features as he smirked. "If this is an attempt to make that man you've been flirting with on your blog jealous please excuse yourself from both situations—"

"Oh my god!" Molly's blush had reached her toes as she brought her hands to her face.

_How does he know about my blog?_ She thought with an internal scream. She kept that part of her life incredibly private. There was just no way he could have gleaned that from her personage.

"That is quite enough, Sherlock." Mrs. Hudson stopped the man before he traumatized everyone's ears with Molly's romantic troubles. "You think everyone's an idiot, my dear, and you need to leave the poor girl alone. She deserves some kind attention." She turned with a wide smile to Molly. "You'll have to tell me all about it later over a cuppa."

"Thank you, Mrs. Hudson." Molly sighed in relief at the older woman and gave her a hug while Sherlock let out an angry huff of air and stood rigidly in front of the mirror, clearly put out by being shot down.

Molly knew for certain that if it had been anyone else but Mrs. Hudson that Sherlock would not hesitate to give her a redressing that might make others crumble into a puddle of tears. She knew that there was more to the relationship between the warm-hearted costumer and the moody director. Even if they didn't have such a uniquely close bond Molly couldn't imagine Sherlock ever treating Mrs. Hudson with as high amount of disdain as he did others—herself included.

The fact was that out of all the members of the company Mrs. Hudson was by leaps and bounds everyone's favorite. She'd been with the _Holmes Theatre Company_ since its founding when she'd just been a young shop assistant. Her talent did not go unnoticed and now she was a highly honored and coveted designer. She could have left the company ages ago to pursue new avenues, but she'd told Molly over a spot of tea that it would be like leaving family and besides, who would take the time to actually put up with both Sherlock and Mycroft.

Equally as important as her steadfast loyalty was the maternal affection she bestowed on actors and technicians alike. She had been venerated to a sort of mother hen status as she dressed and coddled the actors all while making sure to have a kettle at the ready in case someone needed a bit more consideration to put them at ease.

Molly remembered one of the first days that Sherlock had made her feel like living, breathing fungi, Mrs. Hudson had been the one to find her first and soothe the poor woman before she did something as rash like quit.

"You can't stop now, dearie." Mrs Hudson had cooed into Molly's ear while the younger woman had tried to get her tears under control. "We need you."

"I don't think Sherlock believes that," Molly had said with a hiccup. "Why is he so…critical?"

"I wondered the same thing when he was a child," Mrs. Hudson had said as she refilled Molly's teacup. "He was always fussy and I think over the years he felt like he couldn't relate to those around him and became almost despondent in a way, but trust me he can be very sweet."

It hadn't been until Molly had witnessed Sherlock show some small morsel of tenderness for the costumer herself that she had believed Mrs. Hudson's words.  
Mycroft had stormed into a rage over the cost of some fabric yardage Mrs. Hudson had ordered, shocking the poor woman near the point of tears. At the sight of her distress Sherlock had demanded in utter fury that his brother apologize immediately to the distraught woman which, to everyone's surprise, Mycroft did.  
It had been after that moment that Molly noticed the way Sherlock indulged Mrs. Hudson's dalliances better than most people's. He was still rather detestable to her on occasion though it was not nearly as severe as the comments he made against anyone else in the theatre- including John at times.

_Maybe that was another reason why she's everyone's favorite, _Molly thought as she opened up her notebook to take any remarks Sherlock had. _Because even she can get the great Sherlock Holmes to bend to her will.  
_  
"I approved this?" Sherlock fidgeted as he looked at himself in the mirror while Mrs. Hudson attempted to keep him still as she adjusted his costume.

The piece was a tweed ensemble suit with a sweeping cape and a deerstalker hat which was period for the play. Molly didn't particularly like the color on Sherlock, but that stopped neither she nor the costume assistant Maeve from roving their eyes over the man like he was their next meal, much to the stage manager's blushing shame.

"You approved it, Sherlock," Mrs. Hudson said with a sigh as she kneeled down on a plush cushion to pin the hem of his pants that she'd had to let out for him since Anderson was a good few inches shorter than him. "You were standing in the room and had Molly make note of it."  
He turned his questioning gaze on Molly who flipped to the costume annotations she had made her in notebook that he had dictated the last time they had been in there.

"The last time we were in here you did make note that the costume was fine," Molly said as he reached out a hand to silently demand for her notebook. She hoped off the workbench she had been sitting on and handed it to him as he appraised her notes.

"Honestly, Sherlock, it's not like she's going to read you off a lie," John said as he, much to Sherlock's annoyance and everyone else's' amusement, started to take some photos of the man in costume. He'd already gotten a picture of Sherlock in the deerstalker when he had first stepped out in costume while he had looked like a particularly grumpy five-year old.

Sherlock did not respond to John's statement as he looked over Molly's notes before closing the book and handing it back to her.

"I'm not wearing the hat," he said spitting out the last word as though it were poison. "It is ridiculous."

"You liked it on Anderson well enough," Mrs. Hudson said standing up with a stretch when she had finished with Sherlock's pants.

"Anderson is an idiot. It suited his foppish appearance," Sherlock said with a grunt as he stared at himself in the mirror.

"You look fine," John said. "What do think, Molly?"

"Um…" She bit her lip as she looked at everyone who was staring at her. Sherlock silently demanding she agree with him while everyone else begged her to just appease him enough to make the problem go away. She gulped as she tried to find a diplomatic answer. "I don't know if it's right for Constantine, but either way he'll look…good."

Sherlock smirked as though this were a validation of his previous remarks and immediately took the cap off.

"I'm not wearing it," He said tossing the hat over to Molly who let it rest in her lap while Mrs. Hudson finished pinning.

"I think you're just being vain," Mrs. Hudson said helping him to remove the cloak so she could get a better look at the back of his costume. "You want all those audience members to fall in love with your curls."

"And cheekbones." Maeve whispered so only Molly could hear. She snorted at the remark and covered her mouth to hide her smile when Sherlock gave her a critical look.

"Well if he's a terrible actor at least they can like his face," John said as he started typing away on his laptop. "Sherlock Holmes Returns to the Stage. Mary thinks it will cause quite the stir."

"Doubtful and obtuse," Sherlock said which John chuffed at causing the director to roll his eyes. "The notion of it is obtuse, John, not Ms. Morstan herself."

"I would hope you'd think so," Mary said walking into the costume shop and waving to the other actors as she stood in the center of the room to appraise Mrs. Hudson's work on Sherlock. "Do you think you have him pinned discreetly enough to do a cast photo on set? We have to announce the new players before John decides to spoil it on his blog." John shut his laptop and set it aside.

"I'd never do that," he said with a cheeky grin. Mary smirked at his actions while Molly just beamed at the level of tenderness between the couple who were purely adorable when they were together.

"It should be fine," Mrs. Hudson answered Mary before turning to Sherlock. "As long as you don't make any sudden movements." She placed his cloak back on his shoulders and he twisted in dramatic elegance around to walk out the door before stopping to hiss and clutch his side.

"You never listen, do you?" Mrs. Hudson shook her head as she reattached the pin and forced Sherlock to walk with the gentleness of a kitten the rest of the way to the stage with Molly and company in tow.

* * *

When the press release of the mysterious Sherlock Holmes' eminent return to the stage was published on the theater company's website as well as John's personal blog, both complete with photos, the theatre world caved in on itself with shock. The comments varied between feeling there was no way that such an arrogant director could maintain a proper stage presence to thinking that if anything could save this runaway production it would be Sherlock Holmes' performance alone.

There had been a particularly scathing editorial on the idea from reporter Kitty Riley who had been notoriously harsh about the _Holmes Production Company_ ever since Sherlock had snubbed her over some incident Molly only knew had to do with Jim Moriarty and a play that Sherlock had written that the other man had laid claim to. The dispute was still tied up in a legal battle and Molly found it wise to not mention it for the time being.

Kitty had taken particular glee in ripping apart Sherlock when the scandal broke and even mentioned it in her current review by stating: "_The Reichenbach Fall_ is a clear example of the kind of shoddy work Sherlock Holmes can produce. This reporter projects that his version of _The Seagull_ will be rife with elements stolen from other great masters and that Mr. Holmes' performance will be just a cheap rendition of a true actor's talent."

In private, Molly had admitted to Mary and Mrs. Hudson over tea that she wouldn't mind seeing Kitty tarred and feathered. "She'd look better as a great big chicken," Molly had said to which both Mary and Mrs. Hudson had laughed at and nodded in whole-hearted agreement.

Still, despite Kitty Riley's dubious review, the frenzy that Sherlock Holmes as an actor had created increased ticket sales. People were outright curious over what this man who claimed to be one of the most superior minds in the directorial field would accomplish as an actor and this led to Mary announcing that they were almost at full capacity for opening night during Friday's afternoon rehearsal. This made Molly feel like her worries had dissipated a margin and excitement overtook her senses.

It was with this news and the whirl of activity on John's blog as people wrote their support in daily over the theater's venture that Molly went on her date with Walter feeling less stressed. The pressure she had been under was waning away as things started to look up so Molly had gushed, as any normal person would, over her dinner with Walter about how miraculous this was, that maybe things would turn around indefinitely for the company, and that Sherlock's performance was certain to make audiences leave the theatre in awe. Walter, on the other hand, was reluctant to share in her joy as he found ways to edge in negative comments about the whole process.

Saying things like "They'll forget him in a month", "One play does not make up for several seasons worth of terrible choices", and "I feel like his performance would be wooden at best".

Molly had been quick to argue in favor of the company and at one point when they were in the middle of the meal and Walter had leaned back in his chair with a huff of air that she expressed her confusion over his attitude.

"I don't understand, shouldn't you be happy? This is good for all us," Molly said.

"I'm sorry." Walter closed his eyes and shook his head. "But I wanted to come on a date with _you_ and hear about _your _interests not how bloody wonderful Sherlock Holmes is or the attention this play is receiving."

Molly stared down at the napkin her lap. It had been somewhat ghastly that she had monopolized the conversation like that. She was just excited and to be fair Walter had only talked about himself in the beginning of their date. When he brought up the theater in some random point she'd been just so eager to talk about the good news that she hadn't stopped.

"I'm sorry," she said looking up at him as she straightened in her seat. "I'm just excited and I thought you would share that with me."

"It's okay. I forgive you." Walter reached across the table for one of her hands, but she curled them into fists and pulled them out of his reach and into her lap.

"However," she said. "Your comments about my boss and the theater in general are rude and hurtful."

"Oh come on, Molly." Walter's fingers ran an aggravated assault through his blonde hair. "The man is a complete git and I think that everyone would be better served if they left the company. It's falling apart anyways. Mycroft has no control of his brother and Moriarty is succeeding at all turns." He paused and looked up at her through his eyelashes. "In fact, after this production I think you should quit and head over to Moriarty's company. I know I am and I think you would be much happier over there." Molly froze in place as he barreled onward. "It's better compensation, hours are good, and Moriarty doesn't circle like a vulture around you—"

"Sherlock was right about you." She whispered the words and pursed her lips together as she stood up.

"What? Molly come on, don't leave." Walter stood up and blocked her exit as she put on her coat. "You know I'm right. You're just not thinking clearly about all of this. You're as blinded by Holmes' brilliance as everyone else and in time you'll get over that." He placed his hands on her shoulders and Molly shrugged out of the embrace as she glared at him.

"The only thing I'm ever going to get over is you," she said. "And Sherlock Holmes may be a lot of things, but at least he's loyal and brave which is more than I can say for you. Goodnight, Walter." She skidded around him as she rushed out of the restaurant.

"You're loss!" She heard him yell out crassly as she burst out onto the street. She walked down another block before stopping to get a grip of her senses and hail down a cab. After she had spouted out her address to the cabbie she twisted off the scarf at her neck as she felt a bubble of nausea tighten in her stomach. Between her resentment and happiness that Sherlock had been right and Walter was an idiot Molly found the courage to text her director and let him know what had happened.

_You were right. Walter is a weak man_._-M  
_  
She didn't expect comfort from him or a boast about how she should have listened to him in the first place. In fact she was certain that he wasn't going to answer her at all until her phone buzzed again.

_He's unimportant. I need you to come to my flat. 221B Baker Street.- SH_

Molly looked down at her phone. Of all the things he could say that had not been the first thing that had crossed her mind.

_What for?-M_

The performance.-SH

Molly gurgled in frustration. He'd kept her at all kinds of odd-hours this week and made her run several errands for the sake of the production. Surely this could wait until later?  
_  
No.-M_

Important. Need you now.-SH

Molly attempted to ignore him altogether at this point as she stared out the window, not even bothering to text him back when her phone buzzed again. She shut her eyes and tried valiantly to ignore it when her phone started ringing in her hands.

_He's calling. He never calls. It isn't his thing,_ she thought as she hit the answer button knowing she was probably going to regret this.

"Sherlock, can't this wait—"

"Please come." His voice had seemed to drop an octave with need. "I wouldn't call you if I didn't need your help." When she was silent he spoke again. "Please, Molly."

_The magical please,_ she thought with a groan_. Every single time!  
_  
"Not the whole night, okay? I need sleep before we go into tech week," she said.

"See you soon." Sherlock hung up. Not agreeing with nor denying her request.

"I really need to stop caring about you, Sherlock," she said with a sigh.

"Everything alright, Miss?" The cabbie looked up in the mirror at her and she shook her head.

"Change of plans." She waved off his concern. "Take me to 221 Baker Street."

* * *

**A/N:** Sorry it took so long. This chapter was stubborn in it's conception. Anyways, thank you so much for your feedback and for favoriting and making the story part of your alert system. : )

Nan: Happy to see your excitement!  
Mrs. Dizzy: I think I responded to your review. I can't remember! But it was still lovely to receive.


	4. Chapter 4

**Ch. 4** _**It's Always Something  
**_  
221B Baker Street looked conventional from the outside. It had brass fixtures, a coal-black door, and the structure was made of white brick which had been softly smudged with the dirtiness of smog and pollution from the streets of London. For all intensive purposes it was normal. However, once Molly had entered the dwelling to the sound of gunshots she was reminded that this wasn't a tea visit with the Queen. This was the neurotic director she was working for and that meant that this home was anything but normal.

"Oh, Molly!" Mrs. Hudson had met her at the door and squeezed the woman into a gentle hug. "He told John you'd be by. Maybe you can get him to stop putting holes in my walls!" She yelled the last bit up the stairs, but there was only another bang of a gun being fired along with John's own angry yelps for a response.

"Is e-everything okay? I just…should we call the police?" Molly gripped the stair banister in a white knuckled hold as the shouting match continued to rage on upstairs.

"He's not homicidal, dear, just frustrated," Mrs. Hudson said pushing the woman up the stairs with a rather firm grip for such an elderly woman. "John says he's throwing a director's tantrum."

"And I'm supposed to help how exactly?" Molly didn't handle weapons unless they were props. A real weapon was nothing compared to the rubber and plastic she'd been used to being around.

"I dunno, dearie, but he called you." Mrs. Hudson pushed open the door to the chaotic mess of 221B and announced Molly's arrival with an after command of "Don't Shoot".

"Not to worry," John said holding the weapon in his hand and looking a bit worse for wear as he straightened his jumper and hair. "He's been disarmed for the evening."

"I don't see what the problem is. It helps me think." Sherlock collapsed into a gray leather armchair. He was wearing stripped pajama pants, a t-shirt, and a blue dressing gown. It was the least formally clad Molly had ever seen the man. She willed herself not to gasp at the sight of those thin bits of clothing. Her poor imagination was already ruined with images of him in tight-fitting dress shirts. Adding a pajama clad Sherlock with tousled curls did nothing to help the hormones coursing through her body.

_Oh dear,_ Molly thought when something particularly naughty flashed through her brain as she tried to valiantly keep her head out of the gutter.

"Molly is here to help you think." John snapped at his friend as he dropped the weapon into a nearby biscuit tin. "Shooting off a gun is just your way of making everyone testy."

Sherlock just grunted in response as he looked over at Molly. She stood a little taller under his appraisal as she prepared herself for the upcoming assessment.

"I told you going on a date with Walter would be pointless." Genuine glee oozed from him as he said this and Molly huffed in anger.

"You don't have to be rude about it," she said in a soft whisper.

"Oh no," John said with a sigh as he looked between the pair. "Sherlock didn't spoil that for you, did he? You didn't need to come if you were with Walter."

"Actually, Walter did the spoiling." Molly brushed her ponytail to the side as she twiddled with the ends of it. "Sherlock just caught me at an opportune moment." She noted with disapproval that her director was smirking about all of this. Sometimes it was exceedingly difficult to not want to punch that beautifully angular face of his.

"Molly, dear, I'm sorry." Mrs. Hudson cooed as she brought the woman in for another sweet hug. "Do you need to talk about, love?"

"She's fine." Sherlock propelled himself out of his seat and up to the group. "She's here isn't she?"

"You're such a tit." John glared at his friend before looking at Molly.

"I'm f-fine, really, its okay," she said. "It wasn't as though we were dating a long time or anything."

"She made the smart choice," Sherlock said pulling her farther into the flat by reaching around her shoulders, dragging her back from Mrs. Hudson, and tucking her into his side. "Now, we have to work to do. John, go on your date to Ms. Morstan. I know you won't be back tonight after coitus, and you might as well just leave the gun here as I know Mrs. Hudson will only store it in her pantry."

Molly flamed with embarrassment over Sherlock's blunt commentary while John just set his mouth into a firm line and muttered something about Sherlock going to get punched in the face one of these days before jabbing the tin with gun into a bag by the door and storming downstairs.

"Give Ms. Morstan my best!" Sherlock said with a sarcastic smirk as Mrs. Hudson just sighed and John told him to fuck off.

"Goodnight, Sherlock," Mrs. Hudson said before looking at Molly. "Don't let him bully you into staying all night—"

"Yes, yes, goodnight, Mrs. Hudson." Sherlock shut the door in the costumer's face who huffed and muttered something incoherent as he pulled Molly away from the entrance and over to the couch.

She squirmed awkwardly on the soft leather sofa as she dropped her bag to the floor by her feet. This was looking too much like the beginnings of one of those romance novels that she only occasionally dallied in (okay, maybe more than occasionally, but who would know).

"Why do you love?" Sherlock's brow creased in concentration as he stared at Molly who was puzzled.

"I'm sorry, what has that got to do with the performance?"

"My performance isn't _good_." Sherlock sneered at the word as though disgusted.

"Why would you think that? You're brilliant," Molly said.

"No." Sherlock stood up again and started pacing back and forth in front of Molly as his dressing gown billowed out around him.

_Those clothes really don't leave much to the imagination,_ Molly thought with a gulp as she tried to keep her gaze up and focused on her director's face and not his…assets. Not that his regular well-tailored suits didn't hide much either but they didn't show the tone of his torso like the thin scrap of a t-shirt he was wearing or the fact that Sherlock was….well…he was…A blush traveled down from the nape of Molly's neck all the way to her toes.

_Do not say it, do not think it, just stop now or you'll never be able to look him the face again. You are a professional. This is theatre, Molly. You've seen it all before!_ Molly squeezed her eyes shut before opening them again and reeling back in astonishment at the sight of Sherlock hovering over her.

"You're not paying attention." His words were clipped in annoyance; however, Molly noted that the moment their eyes connected he started to smirk and she panicked over what he could see on her face as she glanced around at everything and anything but him.

"S-sorry," Molly said only starting to breathe again once he'd moved out of her personal space. "What's wrong, Sherlock?"

"Constantine is wrong," he said pulling back from her with a dramatic swirl of his ocean blue dressing gown. "He's a bloody idiot who's in love with another idiot."

"Wasn't that why you picked this show? Because it would showcase love in such a sad way," Molly said grimacing at his commentary.

"Yes, but I didn't think I'd have to act out the part," Sherlock said. "Now it has to be right. It has to be perfect and I can't…" He grounded his teeth together as he looked back at her. His blue eyes were bright with irritation. "I can't seem to feign sentiment at the proper moments."

"You are a bit stiff at those parts," Molly said off-handedly as she remembered their last rehearsal.

"I'm well aware." Sherlock bit back causing Molly to shrink back further into her seat in embarrassment.

"That still doesn't explain why I'm here," Molly said as he continued wearing out the floorboards in a straight, simple pattern.

"You're not that stupid." Sherlock crossed one arm around his chest while he brought the other one up to his lips in thought.

Molly rolled her eyes and willed herself to have some patience as she tried to understand her director's intentions.

"Are you asking for my help in understanding how to…feign sentiment?" She felt awkward using his terminology, but saying the word love sounded ridiculous if this was the request Sherlock was asking.

"You're the only suitable candidate," he said confirming her suspicions. "John tries to explain the feeling toward me and then he gets distracted. His face gets this faraway look as he starts remembering his previous encounter with Ms. Morstan. It's quite pathetic and annoying to the overall art process."

"He's in love, Sherlock," Molly said giving him a pointed look. "That doesn't make him pathetic." She took a deep breath as she felt a question bubbling to the surface. "What about Ms. Adler?"

Sherlock stopped pacing and looked down at Molly who broke his gaze and picked at the hem of the dress she was wearing underneath her coat.

"I mean…she would know and she uh…" Molly coughed as she thought how stupid it was for her to bring this up. "She seems to like you." Her voice came out in more of a squeak than she had originally intended.

Sherlock was silent for a long moment before he stooped down again and forced Molly to meet his gaze.

"Ms. Adler likes sex and control." Sherlock clarified as he confined his focus directly on Molly's eyes. "Two things she has yet to receive from me and I don't feel like rousing rumors about being the kind of director that invites actresses to his couch so they can 'earn' a part in his productions."

"But I'm here," Molly said confused. "And it's late."

"Yes, but nobody is going to think that about you. You're just my stage manager," he said popping onto the couch and Molly stiffened at the comment.

"Right," she said feeling the familiar pangs of inferiority that she was still just a 'lackey' of sort in the man's opinion. "Since I'm just your stage manager I don't see why you need me. Surely this is a problem you can figure out on your own." She made to stand up, but he pulled her back down by the crook of her arm.

"That wasn't an offense, it was a compliment," Sherlock said releasing her arm when she stared at his long fingers that were pressing into her trench coat and were warming the skin underneath it. "Now, I need you. You're important for this."

"I do not see how," she said. Really, she was starting to believe that the only thing she possessed over anyone else in his life was that she was patient, like John, and female. If he just wanted a female perspective then she supposed that coming to Molly would seem like an obvious choice since she had proved her competency and tried to not correct him every time he said something hurtful. Why would she? It was losing battle with Sherlock Holmes. He lived his life without a filter or the comprehension of needing one.

"You're in love," Sherlock said crashing Molly out of her thoughts.

"W-What?" She stammered out feeling more exposed than if she had been naked. He couldn't have known about her crush on him!

_Oh, but of course he does,_ she thought with a dejected sigh.

He would frequently make comments about the way she wore her hair or the shade of lipstick she was wearing just to make her stutter, blush, and see things his way. But this was different than just asking her to go fetch another cup of coffee. This was so much more personal.

"That's part of the reason your date didn't work," he said. "Maybe you talked too much about _him_ or maybe Walter didn't resemble him well enough. Aside from the fact the man is witless and isn't the least bit interesting. Honestly, you made a dull choice."

"Sherlock, I—"

"If he's the man on your blog I'd suggest not forming too close of an attachment," Sherlock said. "My suspicions are he's gay."

Molly felt her synapses fire off in confusion and her brow furrowed.

"You couldn't possibly know my follower is gay. How do you even know about—"

"Irrelevant," Sherlock said waving the point away as though it were in the air around them. "Right now, I need you to describe your feelings and why they are important. If you're pining for this person what it feels like. Spare no detail."

Relief flooded Molly along with bewilderment and a tinge of sadness. Sherlock did not seem to understand that he'd been the object of her affection for the past several weeks which made her want to laugh because Sherlock Holmes knows everything about everyone. Why wouldn't he be able to see her stupid crush on him? Then again, he always did say he missed something. Usually it was just some trivial detail. This…this was much bigger.

Despite the relief of knowing that her heart's desires were still well hidden, Molly couldn't bring herself to speak to Sherlock about how she felt about him when he didn't know he was the one she was pining over. Now _that_ was pathetic.

"Sherlock, I can't do that." Molly shook her head. "That's too personal."

"Molly, you're the only one I trust, aside from John, to help me in this," Sherlock said. "If I can understand your emotions and read them clearly enough then I can incorporate them into my performance."

"You're not a sponge, Sherlock," Molly said. "You can't suck up other people's feelings like that. It has to come from you or its fake."

"Which is why I am going to practice with you until I get it right," Sherlock said leaping up out his seat to go grab a script and jamming it into her hands.

"Sherlock, no," Molly said as her fingers curled around the paper. "I just…I can't. Please don't make me tell you."

"Molly, I can glean most of the details just from the way you've walked into the room, but I need to know this. Constantine is a character I cannot understand unless I have your help," he said grasping her shoulders as she shook her head. "Help me, Molly, you're my only hope."

Molly couldn't help it when he said that. What started as a squashed chuckle turned into giggles as she brought her hands up to her face and shook her head.

"I don't understand what is humorous," Sherlock said with a frown.

"Star Wars," she said letting out a breath after she finished laughing and dropped her hands to her lap. "You basically quoted _Star Wars_."

"What is that?" His face crinkled into befuddlement.

_Of course he wouldn't know_, she thought with a wry smile.

"Just a movie, Sherlock," she said with a wave of her hand. "Not important."

"It's important if it incites you to help me," Sherlock said with a questioning gaze.

Molly sighed. How was she supposed to tell the man who she longed for what it meant to be in love with him?

_Well, not love per say, but close,_ Molly thought. Whatever it was, it was intimate enough to warrant not wanting him to find out about it.

"This stays between us," she said. "You can't just pull it out in front of people for amusement. It's degrading enough when you figure out other things I've done, but I am pleading with you, Sherlock, to not use this later." She swallowed when he frowned at her.

"Why would I—"  
"Just promise, Sherlock!" Molly huffed clamping a hand over his mouth before removing it quickly when she grasped what she did had just done."I didn't mean to—I'm sorry." She was blushing bright red again as she stared down at her hands, repeatedly telling herself how stupid that was before he spoke again.

"You have my word," Sherlock said effectively silencing her inner monologue. "Now explain."

His promise seemed strong and he really did not help so Molly nodded and took a deep breath as she began to take off her coat and got more settled into the couch.

"To be fair I don't think I am in love," she said discarding her trench coat over the arm of the couch as she curled herself into the corner and faced Sherlock. "I don't know him that well." Not untrue. Sherlock Holmes was a very troubling enigma to Molly Hooper's poor heart even if she did work with him every day.

"Close enough to what Constantine does anyways." Sherlock waved it off as though it were unimportant. "What I don't understand is why you insist upon mooning after someone who has no affection for you?"

"I just…" Molly fiddled with her hair again. "I mean he doesn't even know, Sherlock. I don't think—"

"Then why care?"

"I dunno!" Molly bit out with an exasperated sigh as Sherlock gave her a withering look of 'that's not good enough, you can do better'. She sat up straighter and leaned the right temple of her head against her hand at the knuckles. It was a question she herself had wondered on several occasions and she still didn't have a very good answer for.

"I suppose that he is my type," she said with a shrug.

"Type?" Sherlock raised an eyebrow.

"Oh uh…some woman like really tall men some like nerdy fellows or short, athletic men." She scratched her head. "You know the kind of person you just gravitate towards because they do something to you emotionally or physically." Molly minded that she should not pay attention to his fingers and the way they curled and twiddled around on his knee.

"John doesn't have a type," he said. "Neither does Ms. Adler. Skip to the part about why you care for someone who doesn't care about you or—" he shushed her when she tried to speak. "Ah, you haven't told him. Why?"

"Because I'm certain he doesn't see me that way," she said. "Exactly like Constantine and Masha in the beginning of the play."

"How could you possibly know what he thinks about you?" Sherlock snorted.

"I may not have your analysis skills, Sherlock, but I'm not an idiot," Molly said sitting up against the arm rest and crossing her arms. "I just…I just know. I don't need to glean some sedentary detail on his shirt collar or shoes to know that."

Sherlock was smirking at her response.

_At least he's amused,_ Molly thought. That was far better than him being dismissive.

"Why do you bother with it then? Constantine, Masha, and Nina are all in love with something they cannot have. Why not abandon it? It's more logical."

"Love isn't logical, Sherlock. You know that," Molly said. "Besides once you love someone you just keep them with you always." When he rolled his eyes and made to speak again she hastened to get out the rest of her comment. "I'm not waxing poetics here, Sherlock. Think of it this way: you care about John and what would happen to him, right?"

"He's my friend not my lover," Sherlock said.

"Yes, but you'd miss him if he wasn't here to help you," she said. "You wouldn't forget him. He's too important to you."

That was an analogy he seemed to understand as he pursed his lips in thought and inclined his head for a moment.

"Intoxicating," Sherlock said. "No wonder the emotion is likened to drugs." He paused, "It still's ridiculous.

"Sherlock, if this is going to work you're going to have to stop you're vendetta against sentiment for a moment. Just…think of it as an important stimulus," Molly said as she hit a mark she thought he could relate to. "Constantine thrives on whatever it is in Nina that makes him love her so long and dearly. In the end of the play you see that he cares about her so much that he wants to take away all of her pain. He wants to try to make things better for the both of them. In a way she's the muse he's always needed and he's the savior she should run back towards."

"And yet she doesn't because she's fallen for Trigorin even if he is her ultimate destruction. Mutually, they all are," Sherlock said and Molly was pleased to see he was trying to follow her logic.

"Remember Masha is in a loveless marriage because Constantine can't see her affection for him," Molly said.

"Would you do that?" Sherlock looked at her in the face again. "Try to forget whoever this person is you're in love by marrying the first man that professes his love for you?"

Molly had considered this fact when she was younger. Of course that had been brought on by a stream of boyfriends who were anything but worthy of her time or affection. Sherlock, she hoped, was just a phase that she could get over.

"It would be better if I did," she said in a defeatist tone. "But I'm not going to marry the first sod who walks into my life and proclaims he loves me even I'm not that desperate." Her vocal chords tightened as she let out a nervous giggle. She really hoped she could stick with that proclamation. It wouldn't be fair to her or the bloke she eventually married if they're union was simply one of convenience.

Molly looked up from the couch when Sherlock had remained silent just looking her over. His eyes taking in the details that everyone else on the planet ignored.

"I missed something," he said off-handedly as he looked back at his bookshelves.

"What?" She was wary then. He could be overcome with the need to know all the details. It would incense his curiosity and could potentially lead to a deeper analysis into Molly's life than she wanted.

"Molly, you look like I'm about to devour your brain. Stop. I don't need to know anything else," Sherlock said making her sigh in relief though she was certain that he was still curious, but was tempering his need for the time being.

_Probably John's influence,_ she thought.

She wondered if the other man had spoken with Sherlock about not being a prat over the situation and about things not to say or to delve into. Then again, Sherlock Holmes also did whatever the hell Sherlock Holmes wanted to do.

"Turn to the end of the play. I want to rehearse the scene with Nina," Sherlock said standing up.

Molly obeyed as she flipped to the end of the text before standing up and waiting till Sherlock had sorted himself out inside his mind palace before turning his glacial spheres on her.

"Ready?" She prompted.

"Always." He rolled his shoulders as his transformation from calm and collected director to a love-starved writer unknowing that he was the missing piece in the Molly puzzle. Something which she hoped he would never discern about her.

* * *

Being around Sherlock was an exhausting process especially when Molly felt like if she wasn't careful she would reveal a little too much about herself to him. She was beginning to wonder if he knew that she liked him and was just trying to spare her feelings by dancing around the issue. Of course, that was never Sherlock's way. Maybe he truly was just ignorant on the subject. Then again he knew about her blog which recounted various details of her days, including Sherlock who was now a big portion of her life, so surely he would know about her crush on him.

Molly felt like her head was spinning over it all and wanted to just drop the subject entirely, but the burning curiosity to know how much Sherlock did or did not know about what she wrote on Tumblr pestered her throughout her evening until he declared they were finished with a surreptitious toss of the script in Molly's hand over his head and near the bookshelf at the corner of his flat.

"Are you sure?" Molly gathered up her coat into her hands and tried to stifle a yawn without much success.

"Is my performance not believable to you?" Sherlock had a frown on his face.

"No, it's just I know you like things just right," she said. "I wanted to make sure you're happy."

"I'm not," he said without pause. "But I need you prepared for tech week. It's already past midnight and not even coffee will help your mood if you don't get enough sleep for this."

Molly smiled a little thinking that was the closest Sherlock Holmes got to sounding concerned about someone else's priorities and not his own.

"Well if you need anything—" She pulled on her coat, fiddling with the buttons and belt.

"I know, Molly," he said grabbing his phone when a text came. He scowled at it for a moment before his face took on a neutral look.

It was when he was texting and had left Molly to leave that she stopped to ask her question.

"Sherlock, how do you know about my blog?"

He looked up from his phone and blinked at her as though surprised she was still there.

"You left your phone unattended at rehearsal and it was open to the conversation you were having with one of your followers," he said as Molly felt her face burn in shame. "I can't remember the name, but he's the one that's flirting with you and who you've probably considered going on a date with since Walter was a failure. Avoid whoever he is."

"I wasn't going to date him," Molly said indignantly.

"No, you weren't," Sherlock said after looking her over. "But you also weren't going to answer his comment and you wound up doing so anyways. People tend to not use their brain when they think romance is involved."

"Ah, right," Molly said as she moved to the door feeling embarrassed and no less worried about Sherlock's obvious invasion of her privacy.

"I didn't look at anything else," Sherlock said when she opened the door and was about to leave. She turned around to him with one hand resting on the door. "John reminds me on a daily basis that it's not looked upon well if you go through someone's personal things without their permission."

"You don't usually listen to anyone's advice, Sherlock," Molly said surprised. It was Sherlock's way—to rip things apart and dissect them. To find out every little bit of knowledge he could so that he could throw it back into their face and make himself the superior intellect in the room. He wouldn't just stop because he gained a moral compulsion.

"You're right," he said stepping closer. "I hesitated on the thought long enough for you to return and didn't get the opportunity to explore further." He cocked his head to the side. "Should I be concerned about what's on your blog, Molly Hooper?"

"No!" Molly immediately answered. "No…just thank you for not looking into it, Sherlock."

"That doesn't satiate my curiosity any better, Molly," he said sounding serious though there was just a small twinge of a smile on his face.

"It's nothing important, Sherlock. Just accounts about my day and pictures of cats," she said which was the truth plus the added attention she had paid to Sherlock in some posts, but he definitely didn't need to know about that.

If he was going to explore the subject further Sherlock didn't speak of it verbally and the pair parted with simple goodnights to one another.

By the time Molly got home it was moving past one in the morning, but her brain was not quite ready to call it a night so she dressed in her sleepwear and pushed Toby out of the center of her bed as she tried to get comfortable.

"Move over you big goof," she said to the orange tabby who mewled in response and stretched out on the other half of the bed while Molly opened up her tablet and logged into her Tumblr.

She had just finished writing a quick post about her time with Sherlock (who she had dubbed as Mr. H on her blog to keep some anonymity about the accounts of her life) along with a cute cat gif she had stored on her computer, when her follower IOUanApple sent her a message. She would have been a liar to say that she wasn't intrigued and a little pleased that he had resurfaced again then she remembered Sherlock's comment and felt her euphoria deflate a little.

_He doesn't know everything,_ she thought trying to argue against his logic in her own brain as she opened up the message.

_**Haven't been blogging for a few days I see. Did that director of yours finally sweep you off your feet? Shame if he did.  
**_  
Molly sat up a little straighter in bed and typed back a quick reply.

_**Why's that? Because you're interested? Haha.  
**_  
She was starting to scroll through the content on her dashboard when another message came to her. Apparently IOUanApple was feeling talkative tonight.

_**No. Because it's so incredibly ordinary of him. He could do better anyways.  
**_  
Molly gaped at the comment and set the tablet aside as she curled her knees up to her chest. That was just…that was just mean. He didn't even know Sherlock and the accounts that she made of him didn't real encompass who he was as a person.

Another message came through.

_**No response, Molly Hooper? I'm shocked. I thought you were enjoying our little talks.**_

Molly froze at the sight of the message. She had never—not once—revealed her name to her followers. She always referred to herself as Ms. Rose after her username MissRosesGarden. It was easier that way and safer except obviously safety was relative at this point. She knew she should just ignore him now. Block the user or even entirely delete her Tumblr account, but there was that nagging voice in the back of her head, the one that had to know more. The one most people, late at night, ignored for the sake of self-preservation. Molly Hooper ignored that instinct of flight and decided to fight instead.

_**Who are you?**_

_**A concerned citizen for your mental well-being, Molly. You and Sherlock Holmes…tsk, tsk, tsk. You're not good enough for that brain, Molly. No matter how many times you help him.**_

_**You didn't answer my question.  
**_  
_**You'll find out soon enough. In fact I bet they'll be calling you about it in 3…2…1…  
**_  
Molly looked at her screen with a frown on her face and then jumped with a loud gasp when her phone rang. She ignored Toby, who was hissing at being disturbed during his nightly slumber, and answered her phone.

"H-Hello?" She brought a hand up to her mouth as Mrs. Hudson babbled on the other line in tears. "Calm down, Mrs. Hudson. What happened? " She got up out of bed and walked over to her bedroom window that faced the street.

"The costumes, Molly." Mrs. Hudson was bawling. "Someone set the costume shop on fire."

Molly froze in the yellow glow of the streetlights as she looked back at her tablet while Mrs. Hudson continued to babble on. A new message popped into her inbox.

_**Once Upon a time there was a little mouse in a vast kingdom who was so sweet and kind. Unfortunately, the mouse was lonely and needed companionship so one day she made friends with a viper and she foolishly told the viper all the secrets of the kingdom. The poor little mouse had to go and tell all her other friends in the kingdom that she betrayed them. Foolish mouse, stupid mouse, she should have listened to the King of her land when he said to stay away…I suggest you hurry, Molly, or you'll miss the big reveal.**_

Molly told Mrs. Hudson she would be there straightaway as she dashed around her room to change. In her flurry to dress Molly's phone received a text and she stopped moving to note that it had come from Sherlock. She sat down on her bed and stared at the screen. He'd sent her a picture of what looked like the costume shop floor with a word scorched into the ground. She zoomed into the picture and winced as the username IOUanApple came into view. She shivered at the sight of it wondering whose unwanted attention she had attracted to her life and workplace when a new message came through.

_We need to talk.-SH  
_  
That's when she decided that no matter what happened she would find some way to make this right because Molly Hooper was a stage manager and it was her job to always make sure that the show went on no matter what.

* * *

**A/N:** _"And then we take the Molly Dolly and Sherlock Figure and make them Kiss..."_ that was the running commentary I had in my brain as I wrote this, but I'm still not sure if I'm throwing romance into the mix with this story or not so I always stop myself. Anyways, thank you all for being patient! I know updates are slow on my end, but you have a whole host of lovely Sherlock writers out there that I'm sure you'll be fine.

Also, have you guys seen the new series 3 promo shots? Looks like Ms. Hooper got herself an adorable looking man! I mean I always knew that Sherlolly would never happen in the series, but that's why we have fanfiction. Anyways, I can't wait for series 3 and what's going to come.

On to reviews:  
Ray- I have produced MORE for you. Hope you enjoy! :)

Aileen- Aw, your review made me so happy the, thank you. :) I'm sure I deviated slightly from proper personality in this chapter, but I'm glad that the majority of the story still keeps true to the characters in your opinion. So again, thank you!

Nan- Yeah, second in character comment I got. Whoop! I was trying to figure out how to add in Jimmy's little involvement in Molly's life and Tumblr was perfect. I'm happy to see that you think that I did a good job in transposing what is in the series to what I imagine in this universe.

Guest (who's nickname is Happy for the time being)- Thank you! I appreciate your review and the compliments to my writing. I tried to edit as best as I can. I'm just so excited whenever I write this I'm always worried that I'll miss something.

Please review! It's always lovely to hear from you all. :) Only maybe two or three more chapters to go. Whose excited? I am!


	5. Chapter 5

**Ch. 5 **_**Pieces **_**  
**  
Hazy, grey colored smoke swirled from the costume shop as the blaze cooled into a dull-smolder. Emergency crews scuttled to and fro in their efforts to keep the fire under control and the crowd back. Molly had to pry and slither her way through the onlookers to get to the front of the police line, praying that the theater was still intact and the fire hadn't spread. However, once she made it to the front of the line she gasped in shock.

The overall structure had not become victim to the flames, the fire having been caught and maintained in time, but that did not mean the rest of the building had remained untouched. The glass cases holding their season's posters had been smashed in and the artwork defaced with crude amounts of graffiti. Their front entrance of glass doors had also been shattered and there was paint slathered all over the outside of the theater that spelled out the anagram IOU over and over again. It was everywhere. Omnipresent and glaring in the face of the crowd in bright yellow spray paint.

Molly felt her heart lurch in her chest at the sight of the destruction and wondered how far it went. She stumbled closer to the wreckage after crossing under the tape barrier with a few mumbled words to the officer near her that she was part of the company and belonged here. She knew her follower had been a part of this when Sherlock sent her that picture, but this…this was more vengeful than she had imagined.

"Molly!" John Watson jogged up to her and the pair embraced in quiet mourning for their situation as Molly scrambled to mentally work out how she could fix this.

"John, is it worse inside? No one's hurt, are they?" They broke from each other as she questioned him and he led her over to the right side of the building where a devastated Mrs. Hudson was being consoled, unsuccessfully, by Mycroft and Sherlock Holmes who both looked ready to explode in rage.

Thankfully, Mary was there to try to ease the tension rising in Mrs. Hudson who looked like she had half a mind to give up her career altogether if this was the kind of nonsense she was going to have to put up with for the remainder of her days.

"It could be better. There were some seats that were splashed with paint, but I think they had to stop when Ernie caught them." John gestured to the stray night guard at the ambulance who was breathing through an oxygen man. "Ernie's wounds are small and no one else was here working at the time." He hesitated for a moment as he ran his fingers over the back of his head.

"What else?" Molly's voice was soft. Almost as if it were shrinking under the pressure of the situation until it was likely to fade out all together.

"They're worried that the fire inspector won't let them proceed with the show this week because of the damage." John was not one to burst into a fit of tears in front of anyone, but there was an edge of heartbreak in his voice over the uncertainty of their situation. "Most of the stuff out here is cosmetic, but if the shop damaged anything structurally…" John's faced turned into a frown as he stopped her right before they joined the others. "Molly, it's…it's not good."

Molly reached out to squeeze his hand right as Sherlock spotted them. He stalked toward them, coat swirling behind him, and nose tinged slightly red from the cold though he seemed unaffected by the chill.

Molly felt her fear rise as he towered over her. Currents of restrained anger were coming off him and every fiber in Molly's body screamed at her to run away and cower somewhere until the entire event blew over, but she just remained there. Frozen. Knowing she had to face whatever was about to happen because she had to find a way to fix this.

"Pull up your blog, _now_." Sherlock ordered without ceremony.

Molly immediately held up her phone, opened the application, and logged in.

Sherlock grabbed the item from her and went to look at her followers as he started to walk away with John and Molly shuffling behind.

"Sherlock, you need to be reasonable." John tried to get the man to act civil, but Sherlock only grunted in response as he went to IOUanApple's page and stared at the screen which was now devoid of all posts except for one video titled _For Sherlock Holmes_.

"What's this?" Mycroft raised an eyebrow at his brother.

"One of Molly's blog followers has taken a decided interest in our activities," Sherlock said showing him the username.

One of Mycroft's eyebrows rose as he looked from the object to Molly herself who squirmed under his penetrating, hawkish gaze.

"I hope for your sake, Ms. Hooper, that you're not involved in this or trust me when I say you'll never be able to get a job in this town _ever_ again." Mycroft retained his full height to look as intimidating as possible, but Molly just swallowed her fear and looked him squarely in the eye. She was still quivering but determined to not be threatened.

"I-I don't know who he is or that he wanted…" She let out a puff of air. "I'm not involved in this, Mr. Holmes."

He gave her another scathing look that was liable to make even a piece of a paper burst into flames before turning back to his brother as if needing confirmation.

Sherlock had looked up from her phone and had crossed his gaze over Molly as though she were some trivial matter that he was forced to contend with.

"She was with me most of the night," Sherlock said though his tone held no warmth to it. "I doubt she had anything to do with this."

"And this person?" Mycroft tapped the bottom of the phone. "What's their role in it then?"

"Let's see and find out," Sherlock said pulling the phone away from his face a little as Mycroft, John, and Molly crowded around in an uncomfortably close tangle of bodies to view the video.

It began with a strange-sounding melody as two red curtains opened up to the sight of several cartoon figures milling about a stage. Each tiny figure had an oversized head of one of the _Holmes Theatre Company's_ most prominent figures (Lestrade, Irene, Mrs. Hudson, John…the list went on though Molly was noticeably absent and it made her curious as to why).

_Guess I'm just a messenger,_ she thought as her importance dwindled in the growing face of knowledge that she was, after all, just the stage manager. Not that she was seeking to be considered important. She was grateful for the reprieve from notoriety especially since this person held nothing but malice for her coworkers and their work.

_"Once upon a time, a kingdom thought that they were invincible."_ A strange, soft voice with a menacing edge to it filtered through the speaker. _"They dawdled on and on thinking that they were doing so well until one of their Kings got a bit full of himself."  
_  
A figure of Sherlock with a gigantic head walked out on stage swaying around. His face was scrunched up into a scowl that made him look hideous. He started to talk in a high-pitched whine and stomp around, waving his little arms and causing the other people on stage to flee. Another figure, deep in shadow, appeared at the corner of the stage screen but did not move.

_"One day the King angered the wrong people and had to venture out onto the battlefield on his own."_ The voice continued to narrate and the Sherlock figure twirled and was dramatically changed into his Constantine costume including the deerstalker. He traipsed to the front of the stage, raised one hand upward while the other remained on his breast, and began speaking in high-pitched gibberish.

_"But the King was unprepared."_ The voice narrated. _"And did what all good kings do when they fail."_ The Sherlock cartoon was being booed by an audience as fruit and other objects were thrown at him until at one point he fell over the edge of the cartoon stage and landed with a loud splat on the ground.

Molly brought a hand up to her lips horrified as red mash sprang from Sherlock's head, his pink tongue lolling to the side his mouth, and his eyes crossed out with Xs to indicate that he was dead.

_"And then his whole Kingdom tumbled down piece…by piece…"_ The curtains on either side of the stage burned and the figure that had once been in the shadows stepped forward until his face was the only thing that filled the screen as he laughed. Two beady eyes filled with smug satisfaction and a face that appeared so innocent now slithered up into a crazed grin of a lunatic.

_"The End,"_ He said congenially as the fiery curtains closed over his laughing features.

"Was that…that was…" John couldn't form a coherent thought while Molly felt like tears were going to start streaming down at her face at any moment as the horrified realization of who she had talked to and flirted with shook her to her core.

"Sherlock, I'm sorry," she said in a soft whisper but the man didn't seem to hear her as he shoved the phone back in her hands and started pacing in an agitated manner.

"I knew I should have paid more attention when he hadn't bothered us in so long," Sherlock said.

Mycroft eyed Molly with disdain, but did not raise his voice much above his usual bored, flat tone.

"Seems you've been speaking to the wrong people, Ms. Hooper," he said.

"I didn't know that I was," Molly said trying to the clear the lump out of her throat in an attempt to defend herself.

"James Moriarty is more cunning than we gave him credit for," Mycroft said ignoring Molly for a moment to look back at his brother. "This could break us."  
"It won't," Sherlock said with a sneer.

"But it could," Mycroft said to which Sherlock just growled. "What do you call this then, Sherlock? It would take a miracle at this point to be ready by next Friday."

"Not a miracle just action," Sherlock said halting for a moment before turning around and heading away from the crime scene, his coat collar turned upwards. "Make sure they don't keep us out of commission, Mycroft. Surely one of your many contacts can keep _that_ from happening."

It was the closest—Molly noted—that Sherlock ever came to acknowledging that his brother held some sort of importance in the needs of the theater.

"Sherlock, what are you doing?" John followed after the man.

"I need to go have a chat with someone," Sherlock said and then stopped when John made to go with him. "Alone."

"Sherlock, you can't go blazing into a meeting with Moriarty." John stood in front of him, stopping him within hearing range of the rest of the company. "The man is crazy. He set the costume shop on fire!"

"No, I'm sure you'll find enough evidence to denote that Walter or some other cretin did it." He gave a pointed look at Molly who willed herself not to stare down at her shoes even if she did feel lower than dirt at the moment.

"Sherlock, just leave it for tonight." John was pleading with him, but the director just brushed him aside. "We need you here!"

"John, make sure Mycroft doesn't do anything stupid like fire my stage manager," Sherlock said as a way of goodbye before he headed off for a cab with John still yelling at him to stop.

It was the only indication Molly got that, even in this maelstrom, Sherlock Holmes still trusted her enough to keep her around. Molly just wasn't sure she could trust herself enough to help put this production back together especially when so much of it was now out of her own hands.

* * *

In the early morning when the fire had cooled to nothing but ash, Mycroft had ordered everyone to return home. Mrs. Hudson was still beside herself with grief and both Molly and Mary returned to Baker Street to keep the poor, old costumer from becoming completely inconsolable.

Ultimately, Mary returned to the upstairs flat to comfort John after he had returned, unsuccessful, from his hunt for Sherlock. The director had vanished and though everyone was more than certain he was meeting with Moriarty, no one could pinpoint either man's location which was more nerve-wracking than watching the video of cartoon Sherlock die.

Molly remained with Mrs. Hudson until the older woman teetered off into the night and assured Molly that she would be just fine. It was then, and only then, that the stage manager crawled out, yet again, into the wee hours of early morning London and found some lone cab to take her back home. Exhausted to the point of feeling both physically and emotionally drained, Molly climbed into her bed with her clothes still on and brought her blankets up to her chin to burrow away her troubles.

_What a mess,_ she thought with a sniff. _How on earth can I help Sherlock fix this?  
_  
Molly's worries left her to sleep in a fitful haze for only about four or five hours before she gave up on the elusive Sandman to cart her away to her dreams. So she sat in her living room where she stewed over a cup of tea, trying to fixate on how they would go forth now.

The Theater had to be cleared of structural damage. It was the only way they could continue otherwise all their hard work would be for not. If they were closed, they would be ruined. Molly trusted the haunted look in Mycroft's eyes when he said that this would completely destroy them as a company. To the world, it looked like they couldn't get their act together. All of that damage would take its toll. How could they fix it all by next week? Worse, would anyone in the company even want to stay after this?

Everyone was already testy because of Sherlock's temper or Mycroft's coldness or some other small discrepancy that made other places seems like better options. The theatre world, no matter how seemingly vast, was small when it came to gossip and jobs. If people started to 'abandon ship' to find some place that was more even-keel then there would be no turning back. That would be the end of everything because the public was _always_ fickle and would _always_ sway their opinions, but theater-folk, they _always _remembered your screw-ups and they never, ever forget the disasters that happened under your watch. So suddenly you're blacklisted until some bloody miracle sanctifies you again and the world rejoices in your return which could be months or years.

This was everyone's mindset when Mycroft had ordered the entire company down to the theater in the early afternoon. Every actor, technician, and administrator crammed themselves into the main stage auditorium and stared up at Mycroft who appeared to be a little haggard around the eyes but still as stately as ever.

Molly was in the very front with Mary and John to her right and Mrs. Hudson to her left who was now clutching at the deerstalker which was the only piece in the costume shop to be saved from the damage that had ravaged the building. Molly would have laughed at how ridiculous it all was except that this was not the time to smile.

"The damage to the costume shop has been cleared as just a cosmetic fix," Mycroft said and the collective breath everyone had held was released.  
"However—" He continued after everyone had taken a moment to celebrate that small victory. "Due to the fact that recent events have plagued us with severe sabotage, it is my consideration that we close for the rest of the winter season until we are ready to face the world again."

Molly was expecting a huge outcry from everyone in protest, but instead there was only silence. She looked around at her friends and co-workers. All of whom seemed tired and weary.

"You can't be serious?" she said not knowing where she found her voice, but it carried through the theater and up to Mycroft. "We've come too far to just stop now."

"Molly it will be okay," Mary said giving her friend's hand a squeeze.

"I think having your costume shop set ablaze is a good reason to cease, Ms. Hooper," Mycroft said leaning on the umbrella in his hand like a cane. "You have to know when you're beaten."

"But we're not," she said to Mycroft before turning to everyone else. "Not really." She looked over at John for support. "I know we can do this."

After a tense minute of Molly imploring the technical director with her eyes to lend his support, he swallowed and nodded.

"I believe in Sherlock Holmes and this company," he said standing up. "We can't let Moriarty defeat us and I know...I know Sherlock can stop him."

"Well where is he then?" Some man yelled from the back in a booming voice. "He's not here now!"

Molly and John looked at each other in worry, knowing that the director was still missing.

"If even Sherlock _bloody _Holmes has abandoned us, I say screw this!" The man said.

"Now just wait a minute—" John's pleas were cut off by the uproarious crowd that seemed to agree with the other man. Sherlock Holmes had abandoned them. If he saw that there was no hope, what was the point?

But just as the crowd of scared members were about to break from the theater, the auditorium doors burst open and in a flood of light and cold air, Sherlock Holmes sauntered down the aisle.

Molly felt some of her pent of tension leave her body at his arrival and had to restrain herself from smothering him in a hug as he walked toward her and John with casual ease. Everyone else just stared at the man in disbelief.

"Am I late?" He looked amused as he smirked.

"Just as over dramatic as ever," John said. "Where the hell have you been?"

"Working on a project," Sherlock said winking at Molly in a way that made her blush, but also left her baffled.

_Just what exactly did that mean?_ She thought.

"We won't be closing." Sherlock made a graceful leap onto the stage. "And it's tech-week. Shouldn't you all be doing something important?"

"Sherlock-" Mycroft grounded out the younger man's name as he fixed him with a glare.

"Nope, I'm resolved," Sherlock said rubbing his hands together before placing them behind his back. "We're not stopping. My stage manager and technical director aren't quitting, why should you or I?"

"We don't have any costumes, Sherlock!" Mycroft was growling. "And the front of the theater—"

"Mrs. Hudson is more than capable of finding adequate replacements and the front entrance is an easy fix." Sherlock waved him off. "Now get off my stage I have a rehearsal to conduct."

Molly gulped as the two titans stared each other down, both unwilling to set aside their arguments until Mycroft's stance subtly shifted and he yielded to Sherlock's determination.

"Ms. Morstan, I'm sure you can take care of coordinating the repairs." He picked off an invisible piece of lint from his tweed ensemble as Mary pulled out her phone and nodded. She kissed John on the cheek and dashed out the door with Mycroft slowly following behind her.

The rest of the company stared at him, cautious of his exit. He stopped in the middle of the aisle, looked them over, and said ever so softly: "Get back to work."  
The crowd gaped at the scene as Mycroft made his way out the auditorium. The moment the doors swung shut everyone started scrambling into action around the theater as the set was redecorated and the cast moved closer to Sherlock.

"Sherlock, I have nothing to work with," Mrs. Hudson said tearing up. "What can I do for you, dear?"

"I have an idea," Molly said to which everyone looked between a mixture of shocked and puzzled.

"Go on," Sherlock said urging her with a motion of his hand.

"Mrs. Hudson." Molly turned to the older woman. "The set isn't necessarily time specific. Maybe a few details are, but those can be easily changed. If the actors were to search through their own wardrobes perhaps they can find some modern equivalent similar to your original mock-ups. After all, we have a week. Surely, we could do that?" Her brown eyes grazed the other actors who nodded at the suggestion.

"I like it though it's not really our decision." Irene Adler turned her blue eyes upon Sherlock who was in a thinking zone that made him look right through the crowd around him to another plane of existence.

"Molly," He said coming out of his revere. "That is—" She waited for the insult to come and shut her eyes at its expectation. "Clever."

Molly blinked up at him in surprise and then just blushed.

"T-Thank you," she said with a small stutter.

"Will you wear the hat then?" John said looking at the object in Mrs. Hudson's hands.

"Absolutely not," Sherlock said. "Actors take your direction from Mrs. Hudson and meet back here at 6:30pm. Molly, John…let's start working on the lights to be ready for a cue to cue tonight."

"But we haven't even had lunch yet," John said just as Sherlock threw the pair of them a couple bags of crisps from his coat pockets.

"There. Lunch," Sherlock said. "Let's go."

John muttered something about ordering a pizza later, but Molly just smiled. Sherlock Holmes liked challenges and if James Moriarty wanted to put one in front of him then Molly Hooper was certain that the director would destroy it—piece by piece.

* * *

**A/N:** I apologize for the major delay. I got sick last week and then super busy so poor Molly had to go on hiatus for a little while. Never fear though, there is only one more chapter left. Opening night, party time, and of course a visit from our favorite psychopath! Huzzah!

Nan: Cliffhangers are my speciality lol Though I think most writers like to buddy-up to them quite often. Glad you liked the last chapter!

Geetha Iyer: Glad you're liking it! Hope you enjoyed this new chapter :)


	6. Chapter 6

**Ch. 6 **_**The Little Theater That Could **_

In the wake of the vandalism done to the Holmes' theater the media scrutiny became thick to the point of debilitating as Molly found that she couldn't even get through the side stage door without being accosted by at least one or two reporters over how rehearsals were going and if she had any statements she wanted to make.

Mycroft had informed everyone that the press was to be dealt with in silence, stating that he and Mary were the only ones releasing official statements because he did not want to see anymore mindless drivel in the papers about the state of affairs in the company. He was already aggravated over the fact that they had been dubbed _"The Little Theater that Could"_ and didn't want anything else that hadn't been strictly approved by him released to anyone.

If the barrage of gossipy interest wasn't enough they had had another three people carry off to other positions elsewhere including Walter who, Sherlock had been miffed to discover, did not start the fire in the costume shop or vandalize any other part of the theater. His alibi soused to the point of Sherlock's satisfaction as well as the authorities' annoyance and proven him to be at a bar with friends that night after his disaster of a date with Molly. Of course, that didn't venerate him to sainthood, but for Molly, it was a slight relief to know that another one of her potential beaus was not a criminally insane nutter. One was quite enough.

The problem with the one, Jim Moriarty, was that he was untouchable. There was a horrid, overwhelming amount of suspicion against him and yet that spider, as Sherlock often referred to him as, was as free of ties to the incident as the Queen herself. Aside from the morbid video on Tumblr there was nothing to suggest that Jim Moriarty was anything, but an innocent bystander in this mess.

Sherlock had been outspoken against the theater owner when one fell reporter had pestered the sociopathic genius enough and soon the media was shifting again back to the scandal of _The Reichenbach Fall_, the suggestion hanging in the air that, once again, Sherlock Holmes was proving himself to be a fraud and a liar.

It broke Molly's heart to see her director ripped to pieces day-to-day in the papers. Sherlock did not care what the press thought of him which John said was his mistake the last time, but the wear and tear of having to deal with the theater's quick and not cheap renovations along with a tech rehearsal burdened with new costumes and a few new props for 'modernization' had left everyone feeling more than a little flustered—including the director himself who had snapped more than once at both John and Molly for a variety of reasons.

Molly had taken the verbal abuse in stride. A part of her felt like it was now her burden to deal with Sherlock's temper as penance for eliciting the attention of her director's biggest enemy which her mind continued to try to tell her was not her fault while her emotions plagued her with guilt over the scandal. Logically, Molly could not remove herself enough from the situation until the matter had been resolved in some fashion. Until then, she would bear the brunt of Sherlock's temper and the rapid intensity of activity involving the mechanics behind the poetry that was Chekhov because that's what stage managers did and she was okay with that.

She just didn't stop to wonder if Sherlock was _not_ okay with that.

* * *

It was Wednesday. The theater would be dark during on Thursday due to it being a performance week so that they could continue the last-minute renovations and technical changes thus making the Wednesday night rehearsal feel even more pressured.

Haggard from exhaustion and worry, Molly had done her best to keep the actors and technicians calm. There was no point in not acknowledging that everything about the company was now riding on this show. The press held them with such scrutiny between the vandalism, _The Reichenbach Fall_, and Sherlock's imminent return to the stage to not warrant everyone feeling tense.

Even Irene and Anthea, both of whom seemed to be unruffled by the slightest changes, held some sort of worrying frown when they thought no one was paying attention to them, but Molly was attune to all the cast's and crew's fears or at least she thought she had been until Sherlock asked to speak with her after rehearsal.

He was sitting on stage still in costume (a grey suit with a crisp white shirt and a blue tie he had discarded somewhere because he hated the accessory) when Molly came up to him, stage book in hand, and waited for what he needed. She was prepared for some vile demand that would leave her awake until early in the morning in an attempt to fulfill it and was surprised to find Sherlock did not speak to her. Instead he just studied her with what she thought was another attempt to illicit the details of her daily life from the way the lint caught on her jumper.

"Sherlock?" Molly prompted him when he didn't speak for another minute. He was starting to make her extremely uncomfortable with his deep, penetrating gaze. The man could bore holes through steel with eyes that piercing.

Sherlock stood and walked to the edge of the stage in profile to Molly. His hands were crossed behind his back and yet still, he did not say anything.

"Sherlock, I need to get home," Molly said with a gentle tone. "What do you need?"

"You haven't admonished me all week." His baritone was at a low register.

"What?" Molly frowned looking confused as he now turned to face her.

"I have been callous in my words this week or at least that's what John keeps telling me although he used less formal wording," Sherlock said which made Molly grin though he remained serious. "Why haven't you crossed me?"

"I…I didn't see the need to," Molly said which only seemed to make Sherlock angry as he scoffed and walked closer to her.

"And why is that?" He pressed.

"I-I just t-thought you didn't need any….uhm, anymore…stress." She lamely finished off the sentence and realized with a wince that Sherlock could tell that was not the reason.

"Do you know what the second most powerful motivator for humans is next to love?" Sherlock waited for an answer, but Molly found she didn't have much of a voice left and just shook her head. "_Guilt._ It makes them all do stupid things for the wrong reasons and you—" He paused for what Molly assumed was dramatic effect before continuing. "…are beyond that."

"Sherlock, I—"

"I wouldn't keep you around if I didn't think you were trustworthy, Molly." Even though his words came out halted almost overly practiced, Sherlock was trying hard to sound sincere. "You obviously need to incorporate more safety in your online activities, but you're not at fault for what has happened."

"If I hadn't talked to him about you though," she said giving into his accusations. "Or the theater than maybe—"

"He still would have found a way to do what he wanted." Sherlock stopped her before she could continue her statement and began pacing. "Think, Molly. Why would he try to use _you_ to get to me? John's blog has more information about the theater than yours probably does judging by your love of cats, so why you?"

"I-I don't know," Molly said feeling overwhelmed. She had debated this same question in her mind before and hadn't come up with a good answer except the one that continued to break her heart. "Is it because I'm not important to you?"

Sherlock stopped walking with a jolt and opened his mouth, shutting it again, and then looking at her.

"No," he said slowly as his jaw locked into place. His eyes shifted to and fro as he sucked in his bottom lip to bite it. He was struggling to scare her off with an angry outburst which Molly wondered if John had warned him against doing. "Just…you're very important. I wouldn't keep you around if you weren't, but that is not why he went after you."

Molly frowned both touched and confused by Sherlock's words. She was important to him, but not in the way Moriarty thought she was. What did that make her then?

Sherlock was tapping his foot impatiently burdened with the knowledge that Molly was seeking and willing himself to wait till she had discovered it on her own which she did when his eyes darted to the book in her hands.

"Oh!" She thought as her mind walked her through it. "Oh, of course. I'm the stage manager…he thought I would quit or something."

"He underestimated your determination to fix things." Sherlock elaborated as he walked back towards her. "He thought by getting into your head and burrowing tight in there that he would make you run, but you are continually a surprise, aren't you?"

"Not to you," Molly said careful to not roll her eyes and allowing a small smile to grace her lips. "You seem to know everything."

"If I knew everything, Molly, then I would have been right in my assumption that you would have left a long time ago," Sherlock said with a smirk. "In that regards, both Moriarty and I did you a disservice except he doesn't know of his mistake and I do." His smug smile turned gleeful toward the end of his sentence as he now saw himself as having one up above his continually perplexing opponent.

"Sherlock, you…you don't have to be that nice." Molly was quiet. She appreciated Sherlock's words, but she didn't know how to handle him. She could block out him casually rattling off her faults as though he were ordering from a breakfast menu or sulking in a corner when he hadn't gotten his way, but being sympathetic, to the point of almost being kind, seemed off for him.

"I'm not. I'm clarifying." The gleeful look on his face taking on a neutral composure. "And I can't have you distracted by your unreasonable guilt when we have a show to do. Do you understand?"

Molly nodded with a small, barely perceptible incline of her head, and for a moment she almost hugged Sherlock Holmes. The one man who was so entirely insensitive to everyone else's needs had just proven that deep down, buried under a layer of his own agenda he did care and he did see with clarity when he wanted to.

"Never expected you to give comfort," she said with a mumbled sniff as she straightened herself up to her full height again.

"John helped," Sherlock said confirming Molly's suspicions about him having to practice being kind. With a wave of his hand as he removed his suit jacket, dropping it into her arms in her books as he walked past her. "Go Home, Molly. I don't need you now."

"Are you sure?"

"Go. Home." Sherlock repeated as he disappeared into the darkness of the backstage area leaving Molly alone and confused.

Something had shifted in their relationship to one another in the wake of the upheaval to their theater. She didn't understand it much all she knew was that her guilt had started to evaporate into the comfort that only forgiveness and Sherlock's logic could assuage.

* * *

**A/N:** So my "just one more chapter" ended up turning into three chapters because it was really long. I'm posting them all at the same because it was supposed to be one big finale and you all have been incredibly patient with me in regards to updating. Hopefully you like them. I've answered my guest reviewers at the end of chapter 8 which I think might leave you all might hit me for. Hope you enjoy


	7. Chapter 7

_**For those of you unfamiliar with Chekhov's "The Seagull" here is a brief idea over what is happening so you're prepared for the upcoming chapter:**_

This play centers around Constatine a writer (played by Sherlock), his mother an aging actress Madame Arkadina (played by Irene), Trigorin a famous writer and Arkadina's lover (played by Lestrade), and Nina an aspiring actress (played by Anthea).

Nina loves Trigorin.  
Constantine loves Nina (meanwhile Masha is secretly in love with Constantine).  
Madame Arkadina (Conny's mommy) loves Trigorin.

Trigorin is a tool-bag and other stupid names and semi-sort of loves both women.  
In the first act of the play there is a short story synopsis that Trigorin comes up with while speaking with Nina: _"A young girl grows up on the shores of a lake, as you have. She loves the lake as the gull does, and is as happy and free as they. But a man sees her who chances to come that way, and he destroys her out of idleness, as this gull here has been destroyed."  
_  
This basically sums up Nina and how her life becomes a downward spiral once she meets Trigorin. That, for the most part, is what you really need to know about the play and that in the end (years later after the first act) she comes back to the estate where Constantine lives with his Uncle. They were once lovers at the beginning of the play, but then Conny screwed it all up so he's trying to win Nina back, but she's been mentally and emotionally destroyed by several dramatic and horrid events in her life—due to Trignorin who is now tucked back into the bosom of Arkadina. It's all very sad and heartbreaking. If you have more questions check out wikepedia, they have a pretty good summary there.

Disclaimer: I do not own Sherlock or The Seagull by Anton Chekhov (quotes from his play have been italsized appropriately).

On with the show!

* * *

**Ch. 7 _The Seagull_**

Opening Night was pure magic in Molly Hooper's opinion and despite all the bitter hell that had been tech week she couldn't keep herself from smiling because despite everything, they were here. They had made it. It was that clinging, childlike gaiety that kept a smile on her face and an air of serenity about her while actors and technicians alike all fretted like expectant mothers that they were not prepared enough. It was that kind of nervous, heart-pounding energy though that brought about great performances and excellent work. With everyone focused on getting it right, Molly knew that they would. There was no doubt in her mind and as she opened up her prompt book and re-checked actors, props, lights, sound, and all the other extraneous details that went into preparation for a show she felt her mind easing into the knowledge that she could handle this as she repeatedly checked her clock for time.

As the house lights dimmed and the curtains rose and Molly felt her heart squeeze in panic as the first few actors dawdled onto stage.

"Cue One, go," She said to her light board operator, a ginger intern named Kevin who was a last-minute replacement for Walter.

He clicked the 'go' button and the stage flared with the white-orange glow of lekos and fresnels. There was a moment of silence and then it began.

The tech booth was eerily quiet with only Molly calling out cues with practiced precision as she watched the stage play. Everyone was waiting in anticipation for Sherlock Holmes. The audience, the techies, the actors…everyone was holding their breath for that moment in time and when he appeared on stage there was a definite reaction from the audience by just seeing the imperious, handsome director whose stage presence seemed to dominate the entire room. Molly could only pray that Sherlock would not suddenly surprise them all by gaining an incurable ilk of stage fright as he spoke.

"Here we go." Tilly the sound tech whispered as she pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose.

As the three technicians focused in on the stage, Molly's eyes widened as watched Sherlock Holmes disappear and Constantine Treplieff dawn on stage with a breathless announcement of: _"There is no doubt you should live in town."  
_  
It wasn't a powerful or even a moderately impressive opening line for the character, but for Molly it would burn in the back of her brain forever as the day Sherlock Holmes ceased to be a great man and became a good one instead.

Sherlock Holmes did not carry the play that night. He did not outshine Greg Lestrade or even Anthea Jones—no, he simply helped to pull the project together and he did a damn good job. It wasn't until intermission that there came an issue in the form of flowers—blackened roses with a card that stated: _**"You're doing better than expected. Let's see if you survive the second act- M."  
**_  
John had been appalled at the obvious display of psychotic flair from Moriarty and had almost gone out into the auditorium to see if he could find the man, but Sherlock stopped him.

"No, not tonight," he said. "We need to wait."

"Sherlock it sounds like he's threatening you!" John's tie was coming undone and his face flushed crimson with anger.

"He's not going to kill me," Sherlock said as Mary started to straighten John's tie. "Not literally anyways. He wants to see if I can manage to pull off the performance. My death will come if the critics skewer me and the production."

Molly and John still insisted upon having Sherlock's entire second act props—especially the gun his character would later use to kill himself onstage—for anything potentially hazardous. Molly knew this was cracking her layer of serenity that she had put on for the crew, but Jim Moriarty scared her more than she cared to admit and after the fire in the costume shop, she refused to take any chances with one of her lead actors' lives.

It wasn't until everything had been checked over-twice and the house manager had said for the third time that there was no one left in the lobby for the past five minutes that Molly returned to the booth. She gave one last look at Sherlock before blocking out everything from the outside world, settling in her chair, prompt book at the ready, and her technicians flanking her on either side like stony guardians.

"Ready," she looked at them.

"Ready." They replied in unison.

"House at half…House out…cue curtains." There was a gentle swish of blue velvet and the shuffle of actors getting into position before Molly whispered: "Cue 30, go."

The audience was quieter during the second half of the show and Molly took that as a good sign. If they were transfixed then they were attentive to the play, it's meaning, and the work that had been vested into the production.

There was not a cue missed nor a line dropped that night. It was wrapping up into a moment of pure perfection.

As they came to the end, Molly felt herself being enwrapped in the veil of theater majesty as Anthea, looking more haggard since a makeup redo between acts three and four, stood with Sherlock who seemed to give himself over to his character—wholly and completely. She leaned forward in her seat as Sherlock gripped Anthea into his embrace, tight and steady like a proper lover and poured out his character's soul:

_"Nina, I have cursed you, and hated you, and torn up your photograph, and yet I have known every minute of my life that my heart and soul were yours forever. To cease from loving you is beyond my power."  
_  
"Damn, that was good," Tilly said as her eyes took on a dreamy quality.

"I think I just fell in love," Kevin said with such open honesty that Molly and Tilly could not laugh, but simply nod in agreement.

_"I have suffered continually from the time I lost you and began to write, and my life has been almost unendurable. My youth was suddenly plucked from me then, and I seem now to have lived in this world for ninety years. I have called out to you, I have kissed the ground you walked on, wherever I looked I have seen your face before my eyes, and the smile that had illuminated for me the best years of my life."  
_  
"Shit! That was perfect." Tilly was starting to cry and Kevin handed her a tissue from his side of the booth while Molly watched with saddening eyes as Nina turned to reject Constantine as he implores her to stay and she does not listen because she is so lost in her own grief and love for Trignorin.

Molly can't help but wish for a happy ending even though she's been there for four weeks and knows how it all will end. She hopes that Nina and Constantine may somehow find peace, if not with each other than somewhere. Some place where happy endings are small slices of lovely in a cruel and intolerable world.  
Anthea, shaking like a leaf on stage as her character, is lost to the sadness of situation whispers:

_"Don't tell Trigorin anything when you see him. I love him—I love him even more than I used to. It is an idea for a short story. I love him—I love him passionately—I love him to despair."_

As Anthea finishes her speech, leaving the stage in a teary blur, Sherlock stands alone at his desk in the upper left corner where he just watches her go.

_"It would be a pity," _He said in a near whispered tone._ "If she were seen in the garden. Mother would be distressed."  
_  
"Cue 51 ready…" Molly gulps in a breath of air as Kevin sits at attention.

There is another brief pause from Sherlock in which Molly can feel the collective pull of the audience leaning forward to see what he would do next. He tears up the papers on stage meant to be Constantine's manuscripts then turns to the door that leads into the room and locks it.

"Cue 51 go," Molly said as the lights in the upper corner fade from the soft hues of moonlight to dark blue as the focus shifted to the garden party on the opposite side of the stage who have been frozen through the interlude between Nina and Constantine until now.

Molly watches as Sherlock raises the prop gun to what his head as the lights fade to black in his corner and the loud bang of a gunshot is heard. There are audible cries from the audience in horror and a few strangled tears which Molly finds some comfort in as she brings her concentration back to the garden party on the other side of the stage and calls out light and sound cues up until the point that they discover Constantine's dead body and an announcement from the other characters stating as such and thus ending the play.

The curtains close and the house lights go up and there is an instantaneous reaction from the crowd as they all scream and cheer.

"Curtain call music, go, curtains go," Molly said into her mike as the velvet curtains burst open and the actors come out at first in pairs and then by themselves as they reach the core characters. The crowd is now standing, excitedly clapping, and screaming: _Bravo, yes, bravo!  
_  
Upon the moment that it is time for Sherlock to come back out on stage there is a large pause and the actors, all awaiting him for their group bows to be made, look around in confusion for the man while the audience starts chanting and screaming his name.

Molly's blood runs cold as she whispers frantically into the microphone to the backstage crew: "Does anyone have eyes on Sherlock? Someone find me Sherlock Holmes!"

There is a scramble backstage—no one can find the man.

"Check again!" Molly was hyperventilating and she can't leave her seat to search for her director as she looks out into the audience and sees a man in a theater box, smiling like he had just won the biggest prize of the century. Her heart stops. It's Jim Moriarty. His eyes connect with hers through the darkened window of her tech booth as he mouths a question: _Where's Sherlock?  
_  
The world was spinning, the cast was starting to panic on the stage, the crowd's cheering has dulled into worried murmurs and right when Molly was certain that Moriarty has gotten to Sherlock Holmes, the man of the hour waltzed out with that smug grin on his face as he came to the apron the stage and bowed in a deep sweep as he eyed Moriarty in the theater box. The tension between the two men palpable in the air until Sherlock turns to the upper balcony where Molly, Kevin, and Tilly are sitting. He winks at them with a smile, holding out his hands to Irene and Greg who are on either side of him as the cast assembles and takes a bow.

The audience's applause is thunderous allowing the actors to repeat the bowing process three times until the crowd's arms go weak thus allowing the actors to move backwards so those beautiful azure curtains can close over their faces.

"We did it!" Kevin is screaming with gusto as he lifts Molly out of her chair and hugs her in a vice grip as Tilly latches on to Kevin's embrace so Molly is encased in a techie-sandwich. She doesn't mind though. Everything fell into place and it was magic. Opening Night always is.

* * *

It was a stage manager's duty to close up shop in the hall while the actors and technicians bound out into the fray to greet their entranced audience who Molly could hear in the back of the theater yelling and laughing with good cheer. She didn't mind being in the midst of the well-wisher's basking glow of praise. Listening to the joyous raucous outside was enough to make her heart warm with pride as she worked.

The show had been a success. Moriarty had not won that night and Molly felt a breath of relief leave her body over getting through the evening. She was starting to clean up the scraps of paper that Sherlock had ripped on stage when the click of dress shoes and a low drawl enwrapped her attention as she turned to face the spider.

"Molly Hooper." Jim Moriarty was walking casually across the stage and stood near dead center.

As she stood up and stared at the man who looked like a potent mixture of murderous yet curious she had the incredible desire to run and the instinctive knowledge that he might actually find pleasure in the chase.

"I was wrong about you. You're not an easy one to rattle…" He walked closer and Molly stepped back to the stage left wing, her flight response kicking in. He chuckled at her action as he placed his hands in his pockets, coming to another stop. "Where's the man of the hour? He and I have some unfinished business."

"Amongst the crowd." Molly lied thanking her stars her voice didn't waver even as the back of her palms started to sweat and she could feel a tremor building in her left hand which she curled and cupped to her chest. She knew that Sherlock was tucked away somewhere—maybe in his dressing room—because the man hated being surrounded by throngs of people. He always managed to say the wrong thing to everyone and on a night like tonight, there was only so far that John's and Mycroft's polite coaching could do for him.

Jim shook his head and grinned at Molly like she was an amusing new toy before he frowned, boring his dark brown eyes into Molly's.

"Do you think I'm _stupid_?" He screamed the sentence out and Molly hated herself for jumping back and placing a hand out in front of her as though that would protect her.

"No, but I say you're making a good show of it now." Molly stilled into a tense pillar as Sherlock materialized out of the curtain from beside her, stepping out to near spitting distance from Moriarty.

"Don't get testy, love, we're only talking." Moriarty looked over at Molly who stood defiant and still as he raked his gaze over her form before eyeing up Sherlock in a similar manner. "You did better than I thought you would, Sherlock."

"Imagine how much joy that brings me," Sherlock said in a dull tone as he walked across the stage positioning himself between Moriarty and Molly so that her view was partially blocked of the mad man. "You've lost the game, Moriarty. You have nothing to gloat upon."

"Who says the game is over?" Jim smiled that cocky, full-fledged grin that showed off all his teeth. "I burned your costume shop, have destroyed your ticket sales repeatedly at the box office, stolen several of your best talent, and brought you to the breaking point. Do you really think your one performance will cease my desire to destroy you and your production house?"

"No, but that was the point, wasn't it?" Sherlock cocked his head to the side. "To prove I had a weakness. To be the last nail in the coffin so to speak."

"I hate clichés," Moriarty said. "You're better than that."

"And you're not? Fairytale themed warnings?" Sherlock raised an eyebrow.

"Touché." Moriarty shrugged with an unabashed calmness to his person.

"You should know when you're beaten," Molly said as the two intellectual giants stared each other down.

"Such spirit." Moriarty sneered at the woman. "What did you do to your new plaything to make her so…brave, Sherlock? A bit like John in that regards—loyal, but she wasn't always like that and that makes her awfully fascinating." His gaze was intent upon Molly as he flicked his tongue across his lips making Molly blanch as bile rose in her throat.

"You're finished," Sherlock said.

"But I'm not!" Moriarty screamed again making both Molly and Sherlock step back at his intensity. "You may have won this round, Sherlock, but this isn't over and I will destroy everyone from Watson to Hooper to your brother. Sherlock, I will _burn_ the heart out of you and I won't have to touch you to do it." He laughed like this was all one big joke though there was no joy written on his face, only frenzied rage.

There was a clamor of footsteps and a fervent yell of Sherlock's name as John came rushing in with two of the security guards behind him.

"Sherlock Holmes and his other loyal dog." Moriarty sniffed and stood up straighter as he brushed off invisible snippets of lint from his suit.

"Moriarty, you need to leave." John and the security guards crowded the other man, each of them looking ready to pound the man into the ground. Tense shoulders, hands closed over their weapons, and knees bent, ready to run after the theater owner if he overstepped his bounds.

"It's so cute how everyone loves you even while you're terribly cruel to them," Moriarty said to Sherlock as he walked towards the security guards. "Don't worry, I'll find a way to make them hate you."

"Get him out of here." John ordered as the guards roughly pushed the smiling theater owner out of the auditorium.

"Wrong day to die, eh Sherlock?" Moriarty's laughter could be heard echoing through the theater until he was silenced by the shutting of the heavy auditorium doors.

"What did he say?" John looked to Sherlock whose face remained blank.

"Nothing out of the ordinary," the director said and Molly huffed as she walked up to the two men.

"He threatened you and said your game wasn't over!" She looked to John whose face scrunched in worry.

"Yes, and that's not out of the ordinary for him." Sherlock's sarcasm started to leak through as he rolled his eyes.

"How can you be so clam about that?" Molly felt like she was going to start hyper-ventilating again and John touched her shoulder to bring her back into focus.

"Okay, he'll be back," he said with as much of a calming tone as he could manage. "And we know he's a psychopath. There's nothing we can do about it right now." John let out a shuddering breath. "But…tonight, you both did well and we should celebrate with the others for that."

"No," Sherlock said clasping his hands and walking away. "I need to think."

"Sherlock, it's just one round of drinks at _Mackie's_!" John was scowling at his friend.

"Not tonight, John," Sherlock said stopping at the edge of the wings making to move again.

"Wait, Sherlock!" Molly rushed after him and halted when he turned to face her.

"I just…" She swallowed a thick lump in her throat as she attempted to not stutter. "You did really… well tonight and you should be proud."

"Thank you," Sherlock said after a measured beat, a brief smile reaching his lips. "You…performed admirably." He squinted at his own words as though he found them inadequate.

"Thank you." A small smile of Molly's own gracing her thin, pink lips. With an inclination of his head Sherlock took off.

Molly turned back to John who took up residence beside her as they watched Sherlock fade into the blackness of the backstage area.

"Do you think he'll be okay?" She needed reassurance from John, but when she faced him, he looked as lost as she did.

"I don't know," John said giving her shoulder a gentle squeeze. "But we'll be there for him when he needs us whether he accepts the help or not."

It was true. Without question, no matter what came to pass, Sherlock Holmes would always have John Watson and Molly Hooper at his side to help him.

"Come on, let's get to the pub," John said breaking the dark mood. "I think the rest of this can wait until tomorrow, wouldn't you say?" He gestured to the stage that still had the torn up manuscripts on and other miscellaneous props scattered all over it.

"Agreed," Molly said finding herself in need of something tall, strong, and preferably cherry flavored.


	8. Chapter 8

**Ch. 8 **_**Interlude  
**_  
Theatre people are rowdy beings when they want to be. Contemplative, sure, but at the end of the night one dirty joke and a few vodka shots can turn statuesque thespians and perfectionist technicians into a rousing, carousing bunch of fools which, after the week they all had, was not a bad thing. To see the smiles on everyone's faces for the outpouring of success over their work made Molly hum in delight. She just wished Sherlock could have been there to celebrate with them although trying to see him cope with the horde of people clamoring that they needed to start doing shots just made her giggle.

It was around one in the morning with some half-hearted grumpiness that everyone agreed they needed to go home. They still had several shows left to go and one night of success wasn't going to keep their production afloat. When Molly walked out of the bar with the rest of the party she started off in the direction of the tube when she was stopped by Anthea who was clutching her phone in hand.

"Wait," she said taking on the authoritative tone of Mycroft's PA that Molly hadn't seen since the beginning of tech week. "Mr. Holmes needs to speak with you."

"Can't it wait until tomorrow?" Molly groaned looking at her watch as exhaustion started to weigh her down. It had been a long night full of far too much excitement at some points for the likes of the shy stage manager.

"Not tonight," Anthea said as a black car pulled up beside the curb where they were at.

There was a moment's hesitation from Molly as she debated over the merits of just storming off altogether when Mycroft's voice could be heard within the car.

"In this lifetime, Ms. Hooper," he said when Anthea opened the door. "It won't be a long conversation."

Molly looked in to the see the older man sitting on the passenger side of the backseat and gazing out at the city. His profile outlined in a yellow street lamp's glow.

"I'll be dropping you off at home, Ms. Hooper. Just get in." Mycroft sounded a bit more like Sherlock and Molly rolled her eyes at how much the two men were actually alike before she got into the vehicle. Anthea shut the door behind Molly and did not join them as they rolled out into London traffic.

There were several tense moments of silence in which Molly assumed Mycroft was piecing together the right words. Something about the way he would glance at her every now and then made Molly keenly aware that whatever he had to say was probably not something she wanted to hear.

"I still have half a mind to fire you, Ms. Hooper," he finally said. "Your conduct as far as I can see on your blog was unbecoming, but if I fired you then I might as well get rid of John for the same reasons and I don't need to have a pouting, sniveling Sherlock moping about the theater because he lost two of his favorite people."

"M-My conduct w-will be much better in the future," she said picking at the ends of her black shirt that was now stained with one of Tilly's beers.

"I trust as much," Mycroft said his tone crisp and even. "Especially now since Moriarty has a renewed interest in you due to your…loyalty which I appreciate and commend you for."

"T-Thank you," Molly said sounding unsure of herself. One minute the man was threatening to fire her and the next he was complimenting her. The Holmes men were so drastic in their emotional approaches it was going to give Molly whiplash.

"Ms. Hooper." Mycroft held out another breath as he spoke her name. "You're the first stage manager we've gotten to keep for Sherlock in a very long time, but…your blog." He paused to look at her. "You need to squash the feelings you have for him."

Molly swallowed as she felt her heart constrict in her chest. Her hands clenched together in her lap to keep her from shaking as Mycroft continued on.

"My brother does not do romantic entanglements," he said. "He pushes people away, abuses their trust, uses others for his own desires…the man cannot be helped. Somehow you all still love him despite the fact that he is as unaware of social formalities as a toddler."

She'd almost laughed at the statement if it not for the very strange twist in conversation. This sounded something more like John might say to her—if he knew about the content on her blog and just how deeply her affections ran for Sherlock. This uncharacteristically sensitive attitude of Mycroft was even more puzzling than Sherlock thanking her for her work.

"Why are you telling me this?" She chanced a glance at him and caught his eye.

"Because even if I don't like that you got Moriarty's attention, I appreciate that you've managed to keep my brother's." He re-straightened himself in his seat. This subject was uncomfortable for him if the slight way he fidgeted was any indication to Molly. "And my worry is that if you continue to try to pursue anything of a romantic nature with him you will only end up hurting yourself and him."

Molly actually laughed in a strangled chortle that indicated more misery than joy before she brought a hand up to her mouth and shook her head. She looked away from Mycroft to the cityscape glowing outside.

"Sounds like you just don't want to lose the only stage manager who has been able to work for Sherlock."

"Admittedly, yes." Mycroft didn't even twitch at her accusatory tone. "But you'll be miserable if you continue like this."

"Do…do you not think I have not tried, Mr. Holmes?" Molly dared to raise her voice a fraction as her pain bubbled over. "It's just…unbelievably difficult and it's not like he doesn't make it a bit easy it's just—" She stopped, unable to continue. She didn't have a good reason to care or not care as much as she did about Sherlock Holmes.

It had just been a silly crush and then suddenly it was like her heart opened and before she knew it the director had hovelled a space for himself inside and now she couldn't get him out.

A moment in the play ran through her head where Masha, confronted with the fact that she would never gain any kind of romantic entanglement with Constantine, had said: _"I tell you honestly, I should not have lived another day if he had wounded himself fatally. Yet I am courageous; I have decided to tear this love of mine out of my heart by the roots."  
_  
Molly desperately wanted that kind of conviction even if it made her miserable because something had to better than where she was now.

"Amazing the parallels you can see between a play and the real world, wouldn't you say, Ms. Hooper?" Mycroft interrupted her train of thought as if he knew what she was thinking and she paled in color at the notion as they pulled up to her building.

"I cannot make any promises about my own feelings," she said when they came to a complete stop. The driver got out and opened up her door for her. The cold November air rushed in as Mycroft made one last plea.

"Ms. Hooper, for you own sake, I hope that you can," Mycroft said. "It would be better for everyone involved."

Molly inclined her head as she mumbled a goodbye and got out of the vehicle, not bothering to watch it disappear as she made her way into her empty flat. She hung up her coat and purse, kicked off her shoes, and collapsed onto the couch in her living room with a huff of air as her body was lulled into relaxation.  
Toby, her tabby cat, jumped onto her stomach and pawed at her shirt as she petted him absentmindedly.

"Tonight went well," she said to the feline as his hair clung to the dark fabric of her clothing. "It wasn't perfect, but it was enough…" She looked around her empty home and sighed. "It's always just enough."

She brushed aside the tabby and brought out her tablet, opening up to her blog which had remained unattended to in the past week, not that anyone of her followers had noticed. She opened a text box and stared at the white screen for a moment before closing the application and pulling up John's blog to look for the picture with Sherlock in the deerstalker looking miffed.

Sherlock Holmes was brilliant. He was this inferno that Molly could feel herself being pulled towards every time she was in his presence. The man was magnetic even as he tried to repulse everyone away from with his snide remarks and painful attention to details.

Molly wasn't like that. She didn't draw people in or make them feel pathetic or entrap them into her own plans. She could be a pushover at times, could feel herself trying to blend into the wall at social occasions, and above all, was kind almost to a fault. She just didn't command the kind attention that Sherlock did and in the end she was the stage manager and he was her director.

Oh yes, she was important and well liked and looked after, but if she had to do her job effectively Mycroft was right. She had to give up on Sherlock. It was the right thing to do and Molly Hooper always did the right thing for her productions. _Always._

* * *

**A/N**: What? Mycroft blowing holes in my Sherlolly ship! Not cool! He's such a lovely muse though. Anyways, here's the deal lovelies, I think I'll write a sequel for this because I'm a sucker for happier endings and we need to get rid of Moriarty. Unfortunately, it may take me some time to organize a plotline around that and I'll need time to find another play. If you have suggestions for the plot or a simple "JUST HAVE THEM KISS ALREADY" I am all ears. I could use the assistance.

Onto reviews:  
**Nan:** I'm glad Moriarty is coming off as creepily perfect. A good-old fashion villain needs to be done properly so I hope I treated him well. Now that Sherlock Season 3 is upon us maybe you won't hate me as much since I left this at such a terrible cliffhanger. My bad...I offer cookies as solace.

**O.o:** Thank you! It means so much to me that I've converted everyone so well. I didn't think it would work out as well as it did and surprised even myself a few times. Moriarty is a delightful nutter! He has become one of my favorite villians because he's so zany and yet absolute psychotic in his approach. (P.s love that your guest name is a face)


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